Each time she looked up from her monitor Harry appeared distracted, out of sorts. He was not his usual focused self and this worried her. Earlier that day - 10.12 am to be precise - he had received a phone call, his forehead creased with worry, and then he had suddenly left his office without telling anyone where he was going. He had stayed away for over 2 hours, and when he returned he'd shut himself in his office with the blinds closed. Only Ros had knocked on his office door and been granted entry. Ruth pulled her attention back to the work in front of her – her research into possible Nightingale activity amongst British subjects living in France, Spain, Belgium and Denmark. She had enough to keep her occupied for the rest of the week. She couldn't be worrying about Harry. After all, he was not hers to worry about. Except that …... several months had passed since George's terrible death, and she and Harry had become closer ….. much closer …... and Ruth didn't know what that meant in real terms. Were they close enough for her to be knocking on his door and asking him was there anything she can do? Ruth didn't have any answers, so she put her head down and worked.

It was after 4 pm when Ruth felt a presence beside her desk. "I think Harry might need a word."

Ruth looked up into the cool countenance of Ros Myers. "With me?"

"I think that's how this works, Ruth. I tell you, and you respond by saying: `Yes, Ros. Right away, Ros'."

Ruth dropped her gaze to her monitor, hoping that an equally sarcastic response would find its way into her head, but nothing worthy to match the verbiage of Ros Myers appeared. No doubt the very best rejoinder would emerge as she was about to fall asleep later that night, much too late for it to be useful. She continued to ignore Ros, who let out a sigh of exasperation, turned and left, mumbling something about `babysitting'. When Ros was no longer within earshot, Ruth looked up to see Harry's office blinds still closed. Before she had a chance to talk herself out of it, Ruth rose from her chair, and grabbing a folder and a pen as props, she headed to Harry's office door. Out of deference to his mood she knocked once, and then entered.

The light inside the office was low, and Harry sat in his office chair, his forehead resting on one hand. Ruth moved closer, uttering his name. He looked wrecked, like someone had died.

"Harry?" Ruth said quietly, sinking silently into the chair facing his desk. "Is there anything I can do?"

Ruth noticed Harry watching her as she crossed the floor and sat, placing her folder and pen on the corner of the desk. He then sat up straight and watched her wordlessly, as though considering how he should begin.

"How close are we, Ruth? Would you consider us to be ….. friends?"

"I'd like to think so. For me anyway, I have ….. moved on from what happened when ….."

"When you returned from Cyprus?"

Ruth nodded. The word `Cyprus' still stirred confused and painful feelings from within her, feelings which she still had trouble articulating, so she had buried them as deeply as she could. Ruth noticed how closely Harry was watching her, like he was deciding how much he could tell her. Eventually he sat up straight, folded his hands on the desk in front of him, and leaned towards her, his expression still grim.

"This morning I received a phone call from a lawyer," Harry began. "She told me she was representing a woman by the name of …..." And here, Harry looked down at a sheet of A4 paper on his desk, on which Ruth could see a lot of writing, scribbled in Harry's own hand. Harry squinted as he tried to make out the name scrawled at the top of the page. "The client's name is Victoria Rowe, and she claims I'm the father of her two-year-old daughter."

Ruth felt like she'd been slapped. She sat back in her chair, staring at Harry. Was he serious? Was this really happening? "Are you?" she asked quietly.

"Of course not," he said, quite curtly. "I've never heard of the woman, and if my maths serves me correctly, at the time this child was conceived you and I were …... rather close. The child would have been conceived in the summer of 2006."

"When I had to go into exile."

"Exactly. I wasn't ….. interested in ….. that sort of thing with anyone other than ….."

"Me?"

"Yes ..." Harry breathed the word, and it came from him like a sigh. Ruth felt her skin tingle, and her stomach contract.

"So …... what does this woman want? Why is she targeting you?"

Harry sat back, visibly more relaxed. "She says that the father of her child told her his name was Harry Pearce, and that he had an important job at MI5."

"You'd never anounce yourself in that way."

"I know. This woman has …. recently been demoted in her job, and is short of funds. She's looking for money ... in the form of child support."

Ruth swallowed, realising that someone must have set up Harry …... pretended to be him. "So ….. you do a paternity test. Problem solved."

"That's what I told the lawyer. I also told her that I'd never heard of the woman, and that at the time I was not ….. visiting bars, which is where this woman met the man claiming to be me. Of course, she had to go back to the client, and I'm waiting on her reply. The lawyer is trying to stop her client from going to the press with her story."

"Oh, God. Harry, that's awful."

Ruth looked down to see her hands grasping at the material of her skirt, pulling it into a bunch on her lap. The situation was potentially explosive, and Harry's reputation could be at risk. She was not about to allow the worst to happen. "Right," Ruth began. "You have to have that paternity test. That's the first thing. Have you contacted your lawyer?"

"Yes. He told me the same thing. Next, I should try to find out who it was impersonating me, because he's the one who should be paying child support."

"I agree. Was there anything else ….. anything which could point to when the child was conceived? You might require an alibi, although the paternity test will get you off the hook …... that is, if you didn't have a small indiscretion back then."

Harry had been speed reading his notes, his forefinger on the words, when he looked up, his face showing shock ….. and anger. "Ruth …... do you honestly think that back when we had dinner together, and during the time leading up to you having to leave …... do you think I would have done something like sleep with a random stranger? I thought you knew me better than that."

"I know. I'm sorry. I believe you. I suppose I was just testing you. Perhaps if you ring your lawyer, and find out the date when this child was conceived. That might provide a starting point." Ruth stood up, preparing to leave.

"You're leaving?"

For the first time Ruth noticed how lost Harry looked. To her, the situation was totally black and white, and the paternity test would prove it so. Perhaps this was just the very thing to get under Harry's skin. Perhaps this accusation of paternal responsibility had been just enough to rattle his cage.

"For now. If you can get a probable date of conception, and a firm description of the man she slept with, then you might not have to suffer the indignity of a paternity test."

Harry nodded, his eyes sad. He stood and followed Ruth to the door. The office blinds were still closed, so that they were cocooned from the rest of the Grid. Ruth felt Harry's hand on the small of her back, so that when she turned to face him his arm was around her, and they were standing quite close. As they both breathed in Ruth's breasts touch Harry's stomach. She found the intimacy of the moment exciting … inviting. There had been a time – before she had had to go into exile – when she would have been through the door in a flash, afraid of her response to his proximity. Their bodies were like magnets, each to the other, and this still left her breathless. After all this time, and their time apart, any closeness with Harry could still set her heart racing and her skin on fire. The small of her back, where his hand still rested, felt like it was about to ignite. She looked up at him to see his pupils dilated, his breathing as heavy as her own.

"Ruth ..." was all he said before he dropped his hand from her waist and pulled away. The moment was over, but Ruth could feel that this was a beginning, rather than an ending.

"You have things to do, Harry. I'll talk to you once you know more. If you need me to do anything …... anything at all ….. you just have to ask."

Harry nodded mutely, his eyes still smouldering into her own.

"And open the blinds. It's not healthy for you to be moping, and we all need to see you. We need to know you're still ….."

"Saving the world?"

"Something like that, yes."

"I couldn't even save you, Ruth, and I'm doing a rotten job of saving myself."

"Then do something to change that." Ruth was about to turn to leave when she again looked up into his eyes. "Let me know how it goes, won't you. It doesn't matter how late. Let me know. I need to know."

He nodded, and Ruth was sure she could see a smile forming around his eyes. She then turned away from him, sliding the door before she disappeared from sight.

Harry sighed heavily, watching the doorway, but she didn't reappear. He headed back to his desk to make a few phone calls.

When Ruth reached her desk she decided that Nightingale could wait. She gave herself the task of finding the person who may have posed as Harry back in the summer of 2006. She trawled through MI5 and MI6 operatives who were in London during July and August of 2006, but there were no possibilities among them. She was searching through the applications to MI5 in the 12 months from July 2005 to July 2006, and had found two possible suspects, when her mobile phone rang. Harry's name was on the display, and she answered it quickly, looking up to see that his office was empty and the lights had been turned off. The time by the display on her monitor was just after 7 pm.

"Ruth," Harry said. "I'm with my lawyer. He has discovered something in the affadavit by Victoria Rowe. She said that the conception occurred on her 44th birthday, which was July 14th, 2006. She was lonely, and went to a bar to `pull' – her own words."

"And?"

"Ruth ….. July 14th 2006 was the night of our one and only dinner date."

"How? How did you know that?"

"I kept a diary. I wrote about the dinner we shared."

"Can I …... can I read what you wrote?"

"Of course not. It's ….. I say things in it which I can't share with others …... not even with you. The point is, you can provide me with an alibi. Ms Rowe says in her affadavit that she met Harry Pearce at Ronson's at a little before 9 pm, which was -"

"Around the time you were waxing lyrical about the Grand Tour."

"Yes, it was. Ruth …."

"Yes?"

"Will you declare that you were with me that night?"

"Of course I will, and you won't have to have a paternity test."

"No. I won't."

There was a long moment of silence, but this time it was a silence in which their combined relief was palpable. It was Ruth who broke the silence.

"I've been doing some digging, Harry. Do you remember the names John Carstairs and Brian Strachan?"

"In relation to what, Ruth?"

Ruth breathed in slowly, her mind forming a strategy. She really wanted to see Harry. Even though in her private moments she still grieved George's death, she was ready to move on. She was ready to take some risks, and the person with whom she wanted to take those risks was on the other end of the phone.

"Harry," she began, "what if we meet somewhere? It might be easier to …... talk if we're ….. face to face, but first I have to print off the details of these two men. You need to read about them."