State of Emergency
Chapter 10
Apologies for the long delay in posting up this next chapter. The muse deserted me for a while but fortunately I managed to track her down and interrogated her until she agreed to cooperate!
Scene 26
The camera follows the red backlights of a black taxicab as it slows to a stop in a lay-by on a deserted country road. Seconds later a large black car draws up alongside. The driver (middle-aged tall, thick-set male) gets out, opens the door of the cab and lifts out the inert slumped figure of an unconscious Ruth and transfers her into the backseat of the black car. Juliet Shaw, emerging swiftly from the cab, gets into the second car next to Ruth and solicitously tucks a curtain of hair behind the ear of the immobile face resting against the window.. The passenger in the front seat turns round. It is Sholto.
SHOLTO: Who the hell is that?
JULIET (smiles coldly across at him): This is the little goose that's going to lay
the golden eggs for us. This, believe it or not, is the key to Harry Pearce's
heart.
SHOLTO: Well, for all our sakes, I hope you're right. Everything rides on keeping
Pearce and his cohorts out of our business. Aren't you being a little naïve
to think that Pearce will risk the whole operation to save this woman?
JULIET (softly): He won't risk the operation, but he will risk himself. He's done it
before and he won't hesitate to do it again. Ruth Evershed is his Achilles'
heel. All we have to do is bait the trap and he'll come running and without
Harry Pearce at the helm and distracted by Ros's expert mis-information, the
team will flounder.
SHOLTO: If she's that valuable, we'd better make sure that she doesn't come
to any harm – (pause. Sholto smiles unpleasantly) well, for the moment at
least. I don't think we should be too hasty to play our hand. We'll keep our
trump card in reserve until the time is right.
JULIET (turns to Ruth and continues to stroke her hair as she chuckles softly toherself): Slumber on Sleeping Beauty; it won't be long before you're
middle-aged Prince arrives to wake you.
Scene 27: The Grid
Corridor: Adam meets Ros. She smiles at him but her eyes are furtive.
ADAM: I don't like the way things are developing. We brought Ruth back from exile
to help with the Iran crisis and all we have achieved is to put her life in
danger, compromised the operation and further added to Harry's problems.
ROS (in detached voice): You can't blame yourself for Ruth's kidnapping. You
couldn't have predicted she would be a target.
ADAM (in troubled, self-pitying tone): It's my job to make such predictions Ros.
Harry was right. We allowed our hearts to rule our heads and that is lethal
in this line of work.
ROS (bitterly): Well, you seem to be making a habit of it at the moment. Don't
let Ana drag you further down the same road. (stares directly into Adam's
eyes) She's in love with you Adam, that makes her unstable and unreliable.
ADAM (angry): Are you telling me how to do my job?
ROS(coldly): No. I'm advising you how not to do it – unless of course, you want
to further add to the Section's body count.
ADAM: Don't be so melodramatic.
ROS (goes to retaliate with a wisecrack reply, but then obviously thinks better of itAnd merely shrugs her shoulders and turns away.) I don't have time to play
word games with you Adam. Harry's asked me to try all my sources again to
see if I can dig out any more rumours about nuclear blue prints being available
for sale in the UK.
ADAM (coldly): Well don't let me keep you.
Scene 28: Harry's Office
The camera approaches Harry from the rear, so we do not see his face. It goes into close-up on his desk and we see his hand holding a Mont Blanc fountain pen as he adds to a hand-written list that lies in front of him:
RUTH :Initial Questions
Was she taken opportunistically or was her identity revealed to an interested party by someone who had been following her/us?
Those within the Service/Government Departments who would recognise Ruth and
wish to derail the Iran peace deal or promote Iranian nuclear capability.
Attack MI5/SectionD/Me personally.?
Conclusion from initial questions
Most likely that Ruth was seized by chance. No surveillance was detected by Connie or picked up by TH security. However the mode and execution of the kidnap suggests professionals – either Security Services or mercenaries, terrorists etc
Who would benefit from her kidnap?
Interested parties in the current Iran situation – who wants to derail the peace deal or wishes to promote the nuclear capability of Iran? –
Iranian rogue elements/extremists?
Hawks in the Us administration?
British Government officials? – officially we are brokering the Iranian peace deal but who knows what agendas are being played out behind the scenes.
Those wishing to attack me personally – A VERY LONG LIST!!
But a strong possibility. If I include all those who would either like to take revenge on me or would like to take my job then I will be here all night.
So who would have the motive and also be able to identify Ruth or know someone who could?
The Iranians? very unlikely they would know about ex desk staff of MI5 (or at least I hope they are not so well informed or we are in serious trouble).
The Americans? Definitely but I'm not sure that they would have been aware of any 'special' link between Ruth & I, although bloody Bob Hogan is brighter than a CIA officer has a right to be!
UK Security Services/Government? Most likely possibility.
Primary Suspects from within UK S.Services or Whitehall who have axe to grind and who would be able to identify Ruth
OLIVER MACE? – Would be the obvious candidate, but he's still sunning himself in the Caymans, working for that shady Hedge Fund Consortium.
JASON BELLING? – Malicious little viper. A possibility, but in that case what is his agenda?
OTHER CANDIDATES?
The central question remains –
Who could identify Ruth who also knows that we had a 'special relationship???????
Harry continues to write repeated question marks with growing impatience. He covers his mouth with his hand and taps his fingers on the side of his cheek, as he tries to focus his mind. There is a knock at the door.
HARRY (shouting angrily as his chain of thought is interrupted): What!
MALCOLM (popping his head round the door with an apologetic smile): Sorry
Harry, there's something on the Thames House footage which might suggest
someone was actually watching the building when Ruth came out.
HARRY (bounding out of his chair): Who?
MALCOLM (gesturing for Harry to follow him): Well, it's not clear enough to
make a positive identification.
(Malcolm and Harry move swiftly across to Malcolm's desk, where there is a frozen image on the screen in which we can just discern the shape of a figure lurking in the shadows about 50 yards from the entrance to Thames House.)
HARRY (staring intently at the grainy photo): Can you further enhance this image?
MALCOLM: I'm afraid not. That's the best I can do, I'm sorry. I mean, there might still be an innocent explanation. It could just be a passer-by having a fag or waiting for someone but I thought you should take a look – just in case.
HARRY (pursing his lips in frustration): Thanks Malcolm. I don't want to appear to
be clutching at straws, but it would seem to be too much of a coincidence for
there to be someone loitering opposite to Thames House at that time of the
morning and then Ruth be kidnapped round the corner, without there being
a connection. It would appear to give further credence to the theory that
whoever has taken Ruth was watching this building, for whatever reason.
Harry turns to go back into his office.
MALCOLM: Er, one more thing Harry. I can't get a clearer image of the face of the
person in the CCTV, but I can tell you that they are about 5' 10" in height
and probably dark-haired.
HARRY: Show this to the others. It might just jog a memory of someone they may
have observed in the area in the last few days.
JO (in urgent voice): Harry.
HARRY (turns round expectantly): Yes?
JO: There's some urgent Intel come in from 6. One of their agents in Switzerland was
monitoring calls made by an ex-KGB officer called Valentino. Two days ago
Valentino placed a call to his wife in which he said that he had secured the deal
over the nuclear documents and would be couriering them to the UK. She is to
wait on standby for his confirmation that the transaction has been successful and
be ready to leave at short notice, because he will have to disappear quickly. 6 say
that Valentino has booked a ticket to fly out of Geneva tomorrow
morning, but with the current threat of industrial action at Heathrow we can't be
certain where the flight will land.
HARRY (alert and authoritative): If this source is reliable and the call is, as you have
obviously presumed, referring to the plans for nuclear triggers that Bakhshi and
his associates are after; then can you explain what an ex KGB agent is doing
mixed up in illegal arms trading with Iran?
JO: Well according to our records Valentino is not KGB (quickly corrects herself as
Harry glares at her) or rather FSI, anymore. He left the Soviet Union under a
cloud, just as it was breaking up and since then he's been actively working
against Russian interests. He even went as far as helping to arm the Chechnians.
HARRY (grimly): He obviously doesn't want to live to cash in his pension plan.
JO: Well actually, brokering the triggers might just be his pension plan. He's not
so much pursuing a vendetta against his ex colleagues, as making himself
available to the highest bidder. He's certainly not fussy about who hires
him and if the money's on the table he won't care about the consequences.
HARRY (focused and thoughtful): So we have a Russian maverick arriving here in
(checks his watch) a matter of hours; possibly carrying the technological
information that will enable the Iranians to produce nuclear warheads.
CONNIE: This could be the flare that ignites the whole tinderbox.
HARRY (resolute with his most Churchillian face): Well not on my watch.
Jo, Connie – find out which airport he's flying into.
Ros, Adam – I want you there when he arrives and don't let him
out of your sight.
MALCOLM: Why don't we just get him detained by the airport police?
ADAM: Because we have to find the other links in the chain. Who's paying
him and who is he meant to be meeting.
MALCOLM: But couldn't we find that out from Valentino if we arrest him?
I mean, suppose we lose track of him?
HARRY: I agree it's a high risk strategy but he may well not know the
identity of those involved. In fact, as a courier, it's almost
certain he doesn't. Our only hope of establishing who is
responsible and stopping them from trying again, is to play
a waiting game.
JO (hesitantly): How do you think Ruth's kidnapping fits in with all this?
HARRY (frowning): I don't know. There may well be no direct link; but
what is certain is that at the moment we have to focus one hundred
per cent on locating those blueprints and stopping them from falling
into the clutches of the Iranian authorities.
CONNIE: Should we be letting the Americans know about this development?
HARRY (looking pugnacious): I think not. Let's keep the reins in our own hands
on this one.
CONNIE (undeterred): Well that policy didn't exactly pan out well over Kashani
did it? If I recall Bob Hogan called us meddling idiots.
HARRY (irritated): All the more reason to keep them on the outside of the circle.
Especially as at this moment in time we don't know quite how our
transatlantic cousins are involved in this particular web of intrigue.
Until such time as that becomes clearer, I don't want us showing our hand.
CONNIE (dryly): To take your analogy a little further: who else is likely to be
sitting down at the poker table on this one? The Iranians, The KGB?
HARRY(frowns): You mean the FSI.
CONNIE (defensive): Same wild beast.
HARRY: Different circus. (pause, as he shrugs his shoulders in answer to Connie's
question) Who knows.
CONNIE: There are too many unknowables this time around. I preferred the
certainties of the cold war.
HARRY: 'Things past redress are now with me past care'.
Adam and Ros exchange glances over Harry's head.
ADAM: Right. We'd love to stop and chat about old times, but we need to get
ready. Jo , ring us both when you have the information on Valentino's
arrival. Ros, go home and try to get a few hours sleep and a change of
clothes. I'll see you at whichever airport our man is flying into.
Ros shoots a suspicious glance across at him as he indicates that they will only meet up at the airport but Adam avoids her eyes and hurries off the Grid.
HARRY: Adam 's right. Check the arrival information and then you all stand down
and get a few hours rest.
Harry turns back towards his office.
CONNIE ( calling after Harry): So do you intend to take your own advice?
HARRY (without turning round): Yes. I've just got some unfinished paperwork to
go through.
Harry goes back into his office, shuts the door and picking up the list he had been compiling earlier; he sits back in his chair reading through it with a look of focused determination etched across his exhausted features.
HARRY (murmuring to himself as he taps a pen against his lips): The answer's got to
be in here somewhere. I'm just too bloody dense to see it.
The camera draws back to observe the movements of the remaining occupants on the Grid as they close down the screens of their workstations and pull on their coats. Soon only one light is still left burning in the gloom and the image of Harry still at his desk is frozen.
Harry's quotation comes from Richard II, Act II, Scene III.