Let's go round again?

Chapter Eighteen

I'm hoping that this chapter is better received than the last one because although I do write primarily for my own pleasure to receive feedback is a lovely bonus!

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out.

It seemed such a simple task, something that everyone did every moment of their lives from the moment they struggled into the unforgiving world until the moment they took their very last breath and moved onto to what ever horror was next. Yes, such a simple task but it was taking every ounce of his self control and discipline just to inhale and exhale. And pride, yes pride was playing a big part as he warned himself that if he let go and succumbed to a full blown attack it would surely become common knowledge amongst the crowd outside and worse than that Ruth would find out.

She would know what a broken wreck, what a parody of a man he had become.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out.

As his breathing calmed the capering, jeering images that had been surrounding him faded away and he began to relax a little. Oh he knew for sure that they would return to taunt and goad him, they always did but it seemed that this time he'd managed to defeat them. He stood up taller and moved back towards the sinks intending to splash cold water on his face and neck but as he turned on the tap he made damn sure he didn't look at his reflection in the mirror. He wasn't strong enough or ready enough for that challenge just yet.

He was drying his face and neck with one of the soft fluffy courtesy towels provided when the rest room door was flung open and an elderly man who looked vaguely familiar crashed in. At first Harry thought that he was drunk but then he saw that although the man had been drinking he wasn't drunk just clumsy.

"Well bugger me!" the man exclaimed in a loud booming voice "If it isn't bloody Harry Pearce as I live and breathe, thought you were dead old man! Nice to see you, although if you don't mind me saying so you look fucking awful!"

Harry searched his memory trying to put a name to the face in front of him, trying to match the booming upper class voice to a recollection from the past but he was struggling. The only comfort was he supposed that the man must have been insignificant enough to forget.

"You don't remember me" stated the man, amusement evident in his voice. "Well that's a relief. Shows you never thought I posed a threat and you decided to put me out of your mind. Let me introduce myself". And he stepped forward with his hand outstretched in greeting "Arthur Symons late of Her Majesties Foreign and Commonwealth Office. We liaised briefly over the Cairo affair".

As he took the proffered hand Harry searched desperately for some recollection and then it came to him; Six had made a pigs ear of a simple exchange of prisoners accepting a terrorist who'd been in deep cover as part of the exchange only to have the woman disappear off the face of the earth after they'd brought her into the country. And somehow or other it had landed on his desk with the instruction to "Just bloody clean it up Harry". He'd been furious, he ranted and raved but in the end he'd had no choice in the matter and after a lot of patient work and digging the woman had been found and neutralised before she had been able to do any harm. What a polite way to put it he thought, what a benign way to sum up the end of a life.

The man was obviously waiting for him to speak and convention required that he do so "Yes I remember you now" he replied "That was a long time ago. I would hazard a guess that we were both very different people then."

"Yes well I suppose we were. We never did receive official word about the outcome of the incident but we supposed that it had been dealt with and we were informed in a round about but very clear way that any curiosity on our part would be shall we say be frowned upon. Are you still working? Surely not I'd heard on the network (Harry knew he was talking about The Old Boys network that strange hybrid creature made up of males who came from the right families, attended the right schools and universities and belonged to the right clubs. In short what was known in Britain as the establishment) Well I just ask old boy because I could have sworn I saw the lovely Ms. Evershed earlier on this evening and now seeing you here as well. Well it made me think. Although I had heard that there'd been a bit of a falling out between the two of you and she'd left the country? So I expect I've got it all wrong as usual?"

Harry got the distinct impression that the man was not going to move before he got an answer and after all all he had to do was rejoin the party, ask a few questions and he would know that Ruth was here. Part of him wanted to make the man work for his information but he was too wearied, too drained to play silly games. "Yes Ruth is here" he said quietly. His companion waited expectantly plainly hoping for some gossip but Harry refused to expand on his statement instead he moved to the door saying "Nice to see you again Symons but I must rejoin the party I've been gone an age and maybe just maybe I've been missed."

"Not by the lovely Ruth you haven't" Arthur Symons was pissed off that he'd been so swiftly dismissed just as he had been during their previous encounters. As far as he was concerned Harry Pearce was a jumped up pleb, not quite one of them, who was at best a necessary evil; an evil who'd terrified him during their last encounter but know seemed to be nothing more than a shadow of what he'd been. He'd heard on the grapevine that Sir Harry Pearce was in a bad way these days and he remembered how one of Pearce's old enemies at Five had crowed that he'd never been the same since the Evershed woman dumped him.

As he waited for Pearce to respond to his words he could see by just looking that the fire in his eyes had gone out and he decided to have some fun, to poke the bear with a stick so to speak.

"If you're intent on looking for the young lady Harry I saw her going out onto the balcony although I doubt very much if she'll thank you for it, when I saw her she was in the company of that American fellow Gary what's-his-name and I must say they seemed to be getting on like a house on fire, if you get my meaning."

Ruth was sobering up fast. She hadn't realised how much she'd drunk until they'd come outside and the cool night air had hit her. Gary was standing very close to her, too close for her liking but so deep in her own thoughts had she been that she'd not pulled away from him as quickly as she should have done. Now as she did move she swayed slightly and Gary stepped even closer to her catching hold of her arm as he said to her "Let's sit over there Ruth. You're exhausted, you've been working too hard, you take too much responsibility on to yourself. Please Ruth let me help you" he told her as he steered her towards a small secluded seating area tucked away from view. He seated her on the rattan sofa and noticing she was shivering slipped off his jacket and draped it around her shoulders. "Are you really cold" he enquired as he sat beside her slipping his arm around her shoulders "Or is it just exhaustion and maybe something more? Disappointment maybe? Maybe you thought that you could trust someone, someone who'd let you down before, someone who you were considering giving a second chance to and you've realised that they are just the same as they ever were? Sometimes Ruth you know the saying A leopard never changes it's spotsis true and you have to accept that and look around to see what else if being offered."

"Gary" she began not wanting to have this conversation, not now not ever. She was feeling small and plain and unloved and bloody angry, angry with Harry for fitting so neatly into the stereo-type that everyone had of him. That bloody woman had draped herself all over him and he hadn't seemed to be doing much to resit her blandishments and more than that angry with herself for even thinking that they had a chance to begin something cleaner, simpler than the mess that had been their relationship in the past but it had and it would always come down to a question of trust.

He'd let her down so badly in the past; would history just go on repeating itself and did she even want to stick around to find out?