Ruth's Diary - No. 14 (3.4)

[JHyde]

Sorry it's slightly late and a long one at that. 3.4 is a hard episode to write up and explain these two seemingly unrelated missions that later connect. I've also tossed in what happened to Ruth's taxi programme, for those of us who don't own the Personnel Files. Thanks again to almh, who typed up Ruth's entry in that book all those months ago when we first decided to tackle this project.


[18th November 2004]

Sad news to report on 'Operation Meter' or my cab project, as it has been known around the office. Harry ended up being called upon an MP to explain what the hell was going on when numerous cab drivers were caught speeding and were then fool enough to tell the police exactly what they were doing. The MP found out because he was in the back of one of the taxis when the driver started racing away from his fare's destination and rather headed towards somewhere we wanted him to be!

Essentially, I think the project simply became too big and had too much expected of it. The scale I had it working on a few months was pretty much perfect. Typical Whitehall outsourcing messed it up well and truly.

Harry assures me that the original plan was a very good one and that I am not respoinsible for its failure. I do know that, but it still feels like a pretty big one after all that I went through to try and make it work. And it was, after all, my first born project.


[2nd December 2004]

It's been a nasty few days here. We have had Danny and Zoe involved in a joint operation monitoring Nicholas Ashworth, the far left MP and a member of the Palestinian Freedom Campaign. He's well meaning enough, but unfortunately his manifesto can attract the wrong type of people to work for him and it fuels the right wing extremists here at home. Sad to say that Palestine and its politics is still responsible for attacks here on a local level. It's bad enough that they happen on the West Bank without the possibility of them here too.

In any case, Danny went along to a meeting last night at the HQ of this organization and inadvertently met Harry's daughter. She was there showing a film she made in Palestine amongst the volunteers. It was as much news to Harry as the rest of us and he looked wrecked while her face was up there on the screen as part of our surveillance of Ashworth. Only Adam was fool enough to ask the obvious question of why Harry didn't know. He clearly wasn't looking at Harry's face and I suppose his son, Wes, is young enough so that he doesn't know that sometimes families don't end up happy and bright.

But sweetness and family love were far from his mind a few minutes later. There was yet another round of peace talks scheduled between the various representatives for Palestine and Israel (we already had the hotel bugged), but they were postponed after the chief negotiator was kidnapped. She is a woman that Adam and Fiona seem to know well, presumably from old operations together. They chatted as recently as last night and Patricia Noughton (the woman in danger) tipped Adam off about an extremist Israeli nationalist organization called The November Committee. David Swift, the media magnate, is meant to be a member and Noughton warned Adam about him. And then disappeared.

Adam had already tasked me with looking into any Israeli nationalist organizations here in Britain and now he's pressing me hard for them. Especially given Ashworth's known hatred for Swift....there's just too much we don't know.

So now we have two major operations going on. The search to uncover The November Committee [henceforth referred to as NC] and the surveillance of Ashworth and the Palestinian Freedom Campaign [PFC]. None of it's easy though - Harry's daughter and Patricia Noughton don't make any of this easy.

[8th December 2004]

They found Patricia Noughton dead in a field with a suicide note citing an extramarital affair. Supposedly she had shot herself. Of course, it wasn't so. We suspect that she was threatened once they had her in the field and said either she did it herself or her husband and children would go the same way. That poor woman. She must have been so frightened. It's not something you want to think about too much, how awful those last moments of her life must have been.

The plot is thickening with the NC. As hard right and nationalist as they come, they even bandy about the phrase 'Greater Israel', if you can believe it. The painful legacy of '67 lives on. Adam broke into Swift's office and once Malcolm de-encrypted what was on his computer's hard drive we found a list of people we believe are targets for NC - there's no doubt that Swift is involved. Now it appears that Ashworth is a target to be killed after all pertinent intelligence is gathered.

This means there is a spy in the PFC offices, someone we know to be code named Phoebe (something else we gleaned from the results of Adam's thievery). You can imagine how Harry is livid at the thought of Catherine being in any danger while she's still a strong presence in the same place.

I don't like this at all. Adam and Harry are both far too personally involved in this case. It's true that there's some comfort to be found in seeing them both softening over people involved, but I'm not sure it's the best thing for the missions we have running. (Adam quoted King Lear when speaking of Harry's behaviour on this mission and I can't say he's wrong.) I like Adam very much but he is too inclined to 'live dangerously', as he himself puts it. I worry about this approach, although there's no doubt it works for him as an officer. He has too much to lose to be so reckless.

For the moment, Adam has me listening in on everything from the PFC offices. My plate is already more than full but needs must, I suppose.


10th December 2004

I intercepted a phonecall made to Swift from the PFC offices today, requesting a meeting. This could very well be from the NC spy planted there and we're anxious to get our hands on them.

The trouble is that the call was made by Catherine, Harry's daughter.

When we confronted Harry with this intercept, he was terribly angry and sarcastic, as anything we have is all circumstantial. The trouble is that we also had to tell him that Catherine has previously dated a man in Israeli military intelligence. A man who may have recruited her to the same nationalist cause espoused by the NC.

I was ready for Harry to be upset and so I didn't jump the way the others did when he snapped at me. God, I hope it's not true and that she's innocent of this. Leaving aside the fact that her life would be shot to pieces, it would break Harry, I am sure.

I did some scratching around this afternoon and discovered that when she went to Iraq early in 2003 (just as the war was breaking out), Harry sent Tom to be on the bus with her and make sure she was safe. He eventually pulled her out of there under circumstances that, had she stayed, may well have proved fatal, but Tom smuggled her out in the boot of his car.

No wonder that when Danny spoke with her wearing a wire she described Harry as being dead to her.

It's all horribly sad. But sometimes good men can be bad fathers. Harry seems to have ben a disintersted and uninvolved father but who did care and didn't know what to say. Adam says he nearly gatecrashed the meeting Catherine had with Swift.

On that front, in order to find out what happened at the meeting, we can only put Danny on the case. He has built quite the rapport with Catherine so we're hoping he can gain her trust sufficiently.

Danny really drew the short straw on this mission. Not only was he playing the young activist so that he could troll through the computers and find a money trail that might lead back to the NC (it was originally to look into PFC finances), but he's also playing games with Catherine.

I don't envy him this one at all. On the plus side, Zoe has a pair of knee high boots I really like. It's so hard to find the ones that are just the right height.



[15th December 2004]

The good news is that Catherine is innocent. She had been alerted to the existence of the NC by her old boyfriend, Gillad Laska, and was on a mission to expose them. Danny found out late last night and spent the night with her (!) before letting me know this morning. Unfortunately, as soon as he left her, an agent of Swift's attacked her in her home.

Terrifying though it was for her, at least she is safe and isn't involved in criminal activities that would see her locked away. Harry's reaction was relieved and typical but now that Catherine's safe, he and Adam seem to be working together. They've decided to set up Swift for another crime to trap him and we're still out to catch the spy in the PFC offices.

Worrying me though is the fact that Zoe's boyfriend may not be trustworthy. His brother was caught trying to sell photos of the MP and his lover to a newspaper chain. Luckily we had a stringer catch it. I left it with Danny. For all his bias in this situation, he knows Zoe better than I do and will hopefully tell her the right way. This is one of those times you hope there's just been a terrible mistake.


[17th December 2004]

The spy for the NC turned out to be Ashworth's boyfriend, Richard Hollins. He lost a sister in Palestine - she was called Phoebe. Thanks to a bug that Adam's wife Fiona was able to get on him, we found out the truth as Swift called him for a meeting. Zoe and Danny got there just in time.

Fiona set up Swift really well, arranging (with Adam's help) some false evidence of rape that made Swift want to leave the country almost immediately. It's too lenient a punishment for him by a long shot, but it was the best we could do.

Catherine packed up and left to go back to the West Bank. Harry is terrified for her. Danny says they have a ridiculous amount in common and being in different countries may well help their relationship long term. I do hope they manage to talk sometimes. Lucky Catherine still has a father to talk with, whatever his faults.

One final piece of happy news. Zoe told us she's engaged today! Malcolm and I had a quiet chat at the end of the day that was more about what we didn't say - we're both worried about Danny and I hope that whole business about the brother and the photos has been dealt with. In any case, I am very happy for her. But very sad for Danny. This can't be easy for him.


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[lwhite53]

Great entry, thanks. Love that right in the middle of all the gloom and doom, R talks about something as inconsequential as Zoe's new boots -- so Ruth! As is her parsing everyone's emotional depths and the effects their various personal involvements have on the ops they're part of.

[YourFutureMuse]

Hahaha yeah I love the bit about Zoe's boots And Ruthie has a point it is hard to find the right height!!

[Aria]

Really lovely entry, JHyde. I greatly enjoyed this. Ruth's empathy and compassion for Harry, Catherine and later Danny comes across well.
I loved Ruth's line, "Lucky Catherine still has a father to talk with, whatever his faults." You can clearly tell she still misses her father, and watching Harry deal with his daughter may have brought up painful memories.
Loved the operation meter part - Ruth taking its failure personally rang true of the character. Also liked the references to The Personnel File.

[JHyde]

I nearly scrapped the bit about the boots but I kept it in for two reasons. Firstly, it's a diary - there have to be silly, everyday details sometimes. I think for people in that job they can't live on tenterhooks all the damn time. Secondly and as YFM says - it *is* bloody hard to find a good pair!

[lwhite53]

It's the little things like the boots that make this work -- so Ruth to put down whatever flies into her head at the moment, no matter how off topic it may be. It's like the ways she talks -- something just comes winging in out of left field, with no warning.

[Silktie]

What a lovely entry. I liked the reference to Ruth still missing her dead father, and her concern for Danny in light of Zoe's budding romance. Also thought it was good that Ruth noted Adam's tendency to take risks this early on. She and Adam developed a particular understanding later on, especially in season 4, so it's good to see the seeds for this planted early on. Also found it interesting that she doesn't judge Harry for being a bad father, and that she picked up on the fact that a big part of the problem was probably that he didn't know how to express his feelings of love towards his kids.

[Tea Lady]

Good entry for what was quite a meaty time on the Grid for Ruth. I liked her comments about Harry. She didn't judge him even though she may not have approved of his methods as a young father. Hint of Ruth's sadness over her father and how much she misses him. Operation Meter is so funny. I bet Ruth was so upset that it failed.