Slough House

London Rules / C07

Chapter 7

Book 5 Part Two 9354 words POV: River Cartwright, Louisa Guy, Shirley Dander

Summary

River Cartwright and J.K. Coe park Ho’s car in Slough and walk to the hall where Dennis Gimball is due to speak, splitting up to check whether a team has the building staked out. In Birmingham, Louisa Guy and Shirley Dander watch a library where Zafar Jaffrey is addressing locals; Louisa goes inside to study the audience while Shirley stays with the car and the only weapon, a monkey wrench. Gimball, waiting to speak, means to use the occasion to reveal a private truth about himself rather than give in to Claude Whelan’s pressure; his wife Dodie tells him they are keeping their powder dry. He slips out for a cigarette, talks himself out of the confession in an alley behind scaffolding, and resolves to do as Whelan wants. Shirley fetches chips and notices a van that has arrived. Coe climbs the scaffolding to watch the street and sees a tattooed man confront Gimball; River finds them and a fight follows, while Coe, deciding whether to help, knocks a paint tin off the walkway. Shirley advances on the van, whose occupants pull away after Shin says it is already done, and she throws the wrench at it as it goes. Louisa turns back to the hall to learn what has disturbed the audience.

Beats

  • C07S01 · River Cartwright — River Cartwright parks Ho’s car in a metered space in Slough and, remembering whose it is, stops hunting for change. He and J.K. Coe, earbuds in and eyes glazed, trade remarks about whether Coe would shoot anyone; Coe says he has no gun. They walk to the meeting hall, a redbrick building like a primary school behind iron railings and private security guards, and River proposes separating to check whether a team has the place staked out.
  • C07S02 · Louisa Guy — Louisa Guy and Shirley Dander wait in the car outside a Birmingham library where Zafar Jaffrey is due to speak. Shirley has eaten only Haribo and wants food; Louisa sets the plan — one of them inside to watch the audience, one outside — and says there is a monkey wrench in the boot, which Shirley claims. Louisa checks the building on Google Earth, finds no rear entrance and a skylight, then leaves Shirley with the car and joins the crowd going in.
  • C07S03 · Dennis Gimball — Dennis Gimball, waiting in a commandeered room before his speech, tells his wife Dodie he needs a cigarette and she refuses him one. He is weighing a public confession of who he really is, calculating that Dodie will back him once it is a fait accompli. She says they are keeping their powder dry, as Claude Whelan advised, and tells him he will never borrow her Manolos if he is caught. He checks his cigarettes and lighter and asks a volunteer for the back door.
  • C07S04 · River Cartwright — River Cartwright walks the block and a neighbouring one, spots Coe crossing a junction, and inspects a television van at the hall, deciding its crew and cabling look genuine. In a lane beside a scaffolding-clad building he finds wheelie bins and no way through; the building reminds him of Slough House. Standing there as the evening comes down, he decides he will quit the Service if nothing happens soon, then returns to the hall, where a queue has formed, and wonders where Coe has got to.
  • C07S05 · Shirley Dander — Shirley Dander waits ten minutes, then ten more, before going for chips, remembering the wrap of cocaine in her pocket. She has been clean sixty-three days and is unsure whether stopping at zero would feel like failure; she thinks about Marcus and his slot machines. Back at the car she eats cod from the roof, scanning the parked vehicles between mouthfuls, and notices a van a hundred yards away that was not there five minutes earlier.
  • C07S06 · J.K. Coe — J.K. Coe hides in a shop doorway when River Cartwright heads for the hall, then walks on, listening to radio headlines. He recalls the phrase “the watering hole” from a written plan and concludes the attacks are meant to reveal that the target nation designed its own destruction. He climbs two ladders on the scaffolding to a walkway thirty feet above the street, reasoning that heights do not trouble him, only people, and from there sees Dennis Gimball slip into the alley below.
  • C07S07 · Louisa Guy — Louisa Guy sits in the library among fifty-two attendees as Zafar Jaffrey speaks about local issues and takes questions. She works out that the crowd probably contains a plainclothes officer — the petite woman in the front row or the bored bulky man nearby — and two of Jaffrey’s own team, and relaxes when the man helps an elderly woman with her bag. She keeps watching the door, unconvinced anyone will come through it with guns, and unsure what she would do if they did.
  • C07S08 · Dennis Gimball — Dennis Gimball slips outside for a cigarette, enjoying the sense of being out of bounds, and moves round a corner so the queue’s smartphones will not catch him. He reflects that Dodie is his only real friend and that she will be furious he has not cleared his announcement with her, given her column and her contract. He resolves again not to become Claude Whelan’s cat’s-paw and stops mid-reasoning.
  • C07S09 · Dennis Gimball — Gimball smokes in an alley among wheelie bins and finds the full horror of his plan landing on him: his own people would turn on him for it. He decides the future is too important to jeopardise, resolves to do as Claude Whelan wants and keep the story for later, and tells himself that timing is everything in politics. Reassured, he lights a second cigarette from the stub of the first and looks along the alley at a threatening shape coming his way.
  • C07S10 · Shirley Dander — Shirley Dander eats from the car roof while watching the grey van with patched paint, unable to read its registration and sure she has seen it rocking. She remembers being shot at outside Ho’s house the night before and finding brick dust in her hair, and weighs whether the gunmen would recognise her. She fetches the monkey wrench from the boot, slides it up her right sleeve and returns to her chips with her arm held stiff, waiting for her moment.
  • C07S11 · River Cartwright — River Cartwright cannot raise Coe on the phone and finds the hall full, with Dennis Gimball nowhere in sight and the group by the stage checking their watches. He walks the block again, thinking over Coe’s claim that machinery is running and that Gimball may be on a list. Rounding the corner to the scaffolding building, he looks down the alley and sees two figures at the far end: one large and intimidating, the other Dennis Gimball.
  • C07S12 · Danny — Inside the van, Shin says the woman outside is eating chips, and Danny takes his turn at a peephole drilled in the back door. He recalls the woman outside Ho’s house the night before, cannot say whether his shots hit her, and decides it makes no difference. Danny tells Shin he will kill her before they go in, then questions Shin’s commitment, saying his shooting at Abbotsfield hit nothing but a chicken coop; Shin insists he is in command.
  • C07S13 · J.K. Coe — J.K. Coe watches from the scaffolding as Dennis Gimball smokes a second cigarette and a large tattooed man in an overcoat walks up the alley to him. Gimball backs away, repeating “now now now” and waving his cigarette. Coe moves along the walkway to stand directly overhead and decides the newcomer may be nothing more than an angry constituent, so he will watch for a moment; then River Cartwright comes down the alley and things get complicated.
  • C07S14 · Louisa Guy — Louisa Guy stands up and the bored man along her row looks sharply round, confirming him as the police officer. She walks to the entrance pretending to take a call and looks out: Shirley is eating chips off the car roof, and a van without a logo has arrived, its driver turned to talk to someone in the back. She judges that they can do nothing but keep their eyes open, unless Shirley does something ridiculous.
  • C07S15 · River Cartwright — River Cartwright confronts the tattooed man, who refuses to back off and kicks him in the stomach. Gimball’s phone is smashed against a wall; the man seizes his lapel; River elbows him in the nose and the two crash into a wheelie bin, River headbutting him and taking a blow to the head. Above them, Coe weighs fighting against climbing away, decides on a window, and as he turns his foot catches a paint tin and sends it thirty feet down.
  • C07S16 · Shirley Dander — Five minutes later, her chips finished, Shirley Dander sees the streetlights come on and decides it is time to move. She does not fetch Louisa, reckoning two of them would only make two targets, and leaves the folded chip paper on the car roof. The wrench sits in her right sleeve; she hopes it will drop into her hand when she lets go. She thinks of Marcus, and goes.
  • C07S17 · Danny — Inside the van, An reports that the woman is approaching and Danny, holding a semiautomatic weapon, says they move and that he will take her first. He thinks about how this will differ from Abbotsfield. He reaches for the door handle; Shin tells him to wait, and An pulls the door shut again. Shin says it is already done and they must leave, orders Chris to drive, and strikes Danny across the face when he protests.
  • C07S18 · Louisa Guy — Louisa Guy, at the library window, sees Shirley walk purposefully towards the van, her stiff right arm showing where the wrench is. The van’s back door opens and closes, the engine starts, and Shirley runs, throwing the wrench in a long arc that strikes the departing door before clattering down. The van escapes. Inside, chairs scrape and the audience exclaims; Louisa remembers telling River “It’s tails. You get Coe,” and goes to find out what has happened.

People

  • River Cartwright — Slow horse driving Ho’s car; sent to watch over Gimball’s meeting and ends up fighting the tattooed man in the alley.
  • JK Coe — River’s partner on the job; listens to radio headlines, climbs the scaffolding to watch the street, and observes the fight from above.
  • Roderick Ho — Owner of the car River parks in Slough; named only as the car’s owner.
  • Louisa Guy — Runs the Birmingham end with Shirley; sits inside the library watching Jaffrey’s audience.
  • Zafar Jaffrey — Candidate for mayor speaking at the library meeting; described as having a national profile.
  • Shirley Dander — Louisa’s partner, sixty-three days clean; keeps watch outside and throws the monkey wrench at the departing van.
  • Jackson Lamb — Head of Slough House, invoked by Shirley and by Coe as the person who would have said yes; not present.
  • Dennis Gimball — Politician due to announce his return to his old party; slips out for a cigarette and is confronted in the alley.
  • Dodie Gimball — Gimball’s wife and only real friend, a columnist with a six-figure contract; refuses him a cigarette and tells him they are keeping their powder dry.
  • Claude Whelan — The figure whose pressure Gimball is resisting; Dodie refers to doing as he said.
  • Marcus Longridge — Former colleague Shirley thinks about, spoken of in the past tense; poured money into slot machines in the back half of last year.
  • Shin — Leader of the crew in the van, whose orders Danny challenges; says it is already done and orders the van away.
  • Danny — Gunman in the van who shot at Shirley outside Ho’s house the night before; says he will kill her before they go in.
  • An — Crew member watching through the peephole; pulls the van’s back door shut.
  • Chris — Driver of the van, ordered to go by Shin.
  • Joon — Crew member who fell outside Ho’s house the night before and was stuffed into the car; named only.

Places

  • Birmingham — Where Jaffrey’s library meeting is held, a two-hour drive from London.
  • Abbotsfield — Site of the crew’s earlier massacre, where Shin is said to have shot a chicken coop.
  • Regent’s Park — Where Coe worked before Slough House, where assertions needed hard evidence.
  • Slough House — MI5’s dumping ground for disgraced officers; the scaffolding building reminds River of it.

Lines worth keeping

“It’s kind of funny, being in actual Slough.” — River Cartwright, River to Coe after parking outside the meeting hall.

“There’s a monkey wrench in the boot.” — Louisa Guy, Louisa answering Shirley’s question about whether she is armed.

“Doing as Whelan said isn’t the end of anything, Dennis. It’s an interruption.” — Dodie, Dodie telling her husband they are keeping their powder dry.

“I’ll just watch for a moment.” — J.K. Coe, Coe overhead, deciding the tattooed man may only be an angry constituent.

“You killed a chicken coop.” — Danny, Danny questioning Shin’s shooting at Abbotsfield.

“It’s already done. We must leave.” — Shin, Shin ordering the van away as Shirley approaches.

Threads

  • Plants: Shirley carries a wrap of cocaine in her pocket while counting sixty-three days clean.; River decides he will quit the Service if something does not happen soon.; Coe holds on to the phrase “the watering hole” and the written plan behind it, and believes the attacks are meant to show the nation designed its own destruction.; Shirley takes the monkey wrench up her sleeve without having practised letting it drop into her hand.; Coe is on the scaffolding walkway beside a loose paint tin.; Gimball abandons his plan to reveal a private truth in public and decides to do as Claude Whelan wants.; Louisa told River “It’s tails. You get Coe” — a lie she regrets.; Shin’s phone message and his claim that it is already done, with the van leaving before the attack.; Louisa sees the van’s driver talking to someone in the back.
  • Payoffs: The single monkey wrench promised in the boot is fetched and thrown at the van.; Shirley’s hunger, established before the stake-out, takes her to the takeaway and back in time to spot the van.; Coe’s stated indifference to heights, as opposed to people, lets him climb the scaffolding and watch from above.; Gimball’s craving for a cigarette carries him out to the back alley where the tattooed man finds him.; River’s decision to walk the block again puts him in the alley at the confrontation.
  • Continuity: Timeline: dusk at the start; Shirley finishes her chips roughly when the streetlights come on, five minutes after the van is spotted.; Jaffrey’s talk runs forty minutes plus twenty minutes of questions, beginning half an hour after Louisa arrives; fifty-two people attend.; Louisa and Shirley drove two hours from London to Birmingham; River and Coe are in Ho’s car.; Shirley is on day sixty-three, with a bruised cheek and brick dust found in her hair after the previous night’s shooting.; Nobody on the Slough House side is armed; Coe has no gun, and the monkey wrench is the only weapon.; The van is grey with lighter patches, has no logo, and its registration plate sits below Shirley’s sight line; four men are inside — Danny, Shin, An and Chris at the wheel.; Danny shot at a woman outside Ho’s house the night before and does not know whether he hit her; Joon fell there and was bundled into the car.; River finds no sign of Gimball in the hall and cannot reach Coe by phone.; Coe fired three bullets into a killer’s chest at some earlier point, after which he could bear listening to the news again.

Characters

Places