[Interrogation room]
(Madred is having an egg for his meal)
Gul Madred:
Oh, you're awake.
Have something to eat.
I insist. Boiled taspar egg.
It's a delicacy I'm happy to share with you.
(Madred gives Picard a knife to slice the top off the very large egg, but this one isn't boiled. The contents are still alive and moving. Picard downs it in one)
Gul Madred:
Wonderful. Wonderful.
I Like You, Human.
Most people become ill
at the sight of live taspar.
I remember the first time
I ate a live taspar.
I was six years old
and living on The Streets of Lakat.
There was a band of children,
four, five, six years old,
some even smaller, desperately Trying to Survive.
We were thin, scrawny little animals,
constantly hungry, always cold.
We slept together in doorways,
like packs of wild gettles,
for warmth.
Once, I found A Nest.
Taspars had mated and built a nest
in the eave of a burnt-out building
and I found three eggs in it.
It was like finding Treasure.
I cracked one open on the spot and ate it,
very much as you just did.
I planned to save the other two.
They would keep me Alive
for another week.
But of course,
an older boy saw them
and wanted them,
and he got them.
But he had to
break my arm to do it.
The Human:
….must be rewarding for you,
to repay others for all those
years of Misery.
Gul Madred:
What do you mean?
The Human:
“Torture has never been a reliable
means of extracting Information.”
“It is ultimately Self-defeating
as a means of Control.”
“One wonders that it's still practiced.”
Gul Madred:
I fail to see where this analysis
is leading….
The Human:
Whenever I look at you now,
I won't see A Powerful Cardassian Warrior.
I will see A Six Year Old Boy,
who is powerless to Protect Himself.
Gul Madred:
Be quiet.
The Human:
In spite of all you've done to me,
I find you a pitiable man.
Gul Madred:
Picard, stop it, or I will turn this on
and leave you here in agony all night.
Capt. J-L Picard :
Ah! You called me 'Picard'!
Gul Madred:
What are the Federation's defence plans for Minos Korva?
Capt. J-L Picard:
There are four lights.
(Madred uses the agoniser.)
Gul Madred:
There are five lights.
How many do you see now?
Capt. J-L Picard:
(in agony)
You are six years old.
Weak and Helpless.
You cannot Hurt Me.
Gul Madred:
How many?
Capt. J-L Picard:
Sur le pont d'Avignon, on y danse…..
JOOLS
I hope I have viewing rights.
HARRY
Be our guest.
TESSA storms out.
JOOLS
Lively this side of the river isn’t it?
HARRY
Do you want him now or later?
TOM thinks just for a moment.
TOM
Right away.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - THE GRID - DAY 3. 0700
TOM is by the pods. He claps his hands.
TOM
Listen up everyone!
They are all ears.
TOM (CONT’D)
When our guest arrives no staring. He’s a
returning hero, right? Zoe, when he passes
your station say hello, normal as you can.
He jumps off table and goes to the pods. A moment. Then
PETER SALTER - still in black combat gear - approaches
from the other side of the pods, flanked by two SPECIAL
BRANCH HEAVIES. He comes through the pods.
TOM extends a hand.
TOM Peter.
PETER Tom?
Shakes. The pod closes, Special Branch men still behind
it.
TOM
I thought we’d use Harry’s office.
PETER
He’s not here?
TOM
Some function. He was over the moon to hear
you’re out. He’ll be here soon as he can.
FROM PETER’S POV: he looks across the Grid. His vision is
a little blurred. There is a low but even ringing in his
ears - we hear it.
GENERAL POV:
ZOE
Hello Peter.
PETER Zoe.
She smiles. Not a crack. TOM and PETER have reached
HARRY’s office. TOM opens the door.
INT. THAMES HOUSE, MEETING ROOM - DAY 3. 0702
HARRY, JOOLS, TESSA watching intently as - on screens -
TOM and PETER enter HARRY’s office.
JOOLS
Bug your own office do you Harry?
HARRY
Just for special occasions.
ZOE slips in.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - HARRY’S OFFICE - DAY 3. 0703
TOM and PETER SALTER. They sit. Not with the desk between
them.
TOM
Are you OK?
PETER
Yeah I’m OK, touch of tinnitus ... With the
bang bangs.
TOM producing two glasses and a bottle of malt.
TOM
(Pouring.)
Well here we go, Harry’s finest.
PETER
Not for me.
TOM
Anyway.
(Toasts him.)
A triumph.
PETER
You reckon?
TOM
Though you were so off piste you weren’t even
on the mountain.
A little laugh. PETER is forced to laugh too. TOM sips.
TOM (CONT’D)
So let’s do the details. Personnel, what
they’re planning. It is the President’s visit
they’re going for?
A beat. PETER is trying to get his game plan together.
He’s very wary of TOM’s improvisations.
PETER Yeah.
TOM
Where’s their HQ?
PETER
They had me blind folded.
TOM
Any feelings?
PETER
I felt East Anglia.
TOM
East Anglia. Not much cover.
PETER
There were sheds ...
TOM
Aircraft hangers?
PETER
Could be.
TOM
Don’t matter, we’ve got the girl. She’ll tell
us.
PETER very still.
FROM PETER’S POV: the slight blur, the tinnitus. TOM
seems at a strange remove to him.
TOM
And cos of your cover, you went along with
this ... Silly university stunt. What was the
point - theft to raise funds?
GENERAL POV:
The moment hangs.
PETER
Right. They’re broke.
A beat.
TOM
Yeah, we picked the girl up. she got away
from the University, but then did this really
stupid thing. She hurt herself.
PETER How?
TOM
Broken ankle. Her comrades left her. By the
canal.
PETER
They would.
TOM
Hard lot, are they?
PETER
They reckon so.
TOM
East Anglia?
(A beat.)
Shall I make a leap? You always taught me to
make leaps.
PETER
(Rattled.)
Be my guest ...
TOM Wales.
There is the smallest flicker from PETER’s eyes.
INT. THAMES HOUSE, MEETING ROOM - DAY 3. 0705
ZOE
(Punches the air - still a whisper though.)
Yes!
JOOLS
Was that a guess?
HARRY
(Blase.)
East Anglia’s the opposite side of the
country to Wales.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - HARRY’S OFFICE - DAY 3. 0706
A pause. Then PETER pours a glass of whisky.
PETER
Have you just cracked me?
TOM
(Very softly.)
I don’t know. You tell me.
PETER
Fuck you Tom Quinn.
(He downs the whisky.)
The old Cernwyth Army Range, North of the
Black Mountains. I trained there when it was
alive - the same faces, same places come
around. Cheeky though, eh? Anarchists holing
up on derelict MOD property. They’re in
woodland that was called Red Alpha on the
maps.
INT. THAMES HOUSE, MEETING ROOM - DAY 3. 0707
HARRY at once, pointing at ZOE.
HARRY Go!
She’s half out of the room already.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - HARRY’S OFFICE - DAY 3. 0708
PETER looks around. He sees ZOE crashing, running, half
falling across the Grid. He laughs.
PETER
Do you really have Andrea?
TOM
Oh yes. Paddington Green nick. The Special
Branch quiz masters are with her.
PETER
Those animals. I want her here. Now.
TOM Sure.
He lifts a phone.
TOM
Bring Miss Chambers over to Thames House.
INT. THAMES HOUSE, MEETING ROOM - DAY 3. 0709
HARRY on the phone.
HARRY
Rightaway Tom.
Puts phone down.
JOOLS
Use the SAS attachment in Hereford. They’ve
got a Chinook, they’ll love something to do.
HARRY
(Already dialling again.)
Absolutely.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - HARRY’S OFFICE - DAY 3. 0710
TOM
So you walked.
PETER Yeah.
TOM
(Low.)
You, of all people. Why, Peter?
PETER
Boredom. Crippling, chest tearing, bum
clenching boredom. With what the country’s
become ... Boredom with buy, sell, image,
credit card Nirvana and nothing else. I mean
when the Soviet Union was crap you felt yeah,
we’ve got something. My Dad died for it.
Democracy. But now ... Nothing. It’s all gone
... Dead. No one believes in anything
anymore. Then there was Andrea. This ... posh
girl, turning herself inside out. For what
she believed. The passion for a new life, it
tore her apart, run her ragged and nearly
bonkers but ... she was in good faith. I
always thought that about you, Tom. You are
in good faith.
TOM
And you threw everything away to go on a
little robbery for your new Anarchist faith?
It was a feint, wasn’t it. What were you
doing there, Peter? In a Geography
Department?
PETER
When Andrea’s here I’ll tell you.
They look at each other. TOM gives nothing away. But
PETER reads him right.
PETER (CONT’D)
She will be here.
(a beat)
She won’t. Because you don’t have her.
TOM I...
PETER
The old tricks are the best, eh?
TOM
You trained me.
PETER
You bastard...
The tinnitus is worsening. PETER holds his head.
TOM
Peter. Come back to us. You know we don’t
burn our own. You’ll be given a desk job for
a while, something decently meaningless. Then
retirement, pension, the perks. You can be
with Andrea.
It has become very intimate between them.
PETER
She got back to Wales?
TOM
We assume so. Peter, don’t make us crucify
you.
PETER
I’ve got to go to the bog.
TOM Sure.
Stands.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - THE GRID - DAY 3. 0712
TOM and PETER make their way to the men’s loo.
Surreptitious eyes follow them.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - GENT’S LOO - DAY 3. 0714
PETER and TOM enter.
PETER goes into a stall. He tries to close the door - TOM
stops him and keeps it open.
TOM
Peter. I still respect you. I want to keep
that.
PETER
You won’t put me out to grass, will you?
There’ll be no dream retirement cottage with
garden, Andrea picking roses in a see-through
chiffon dress. Don’t kid me, Tom. There’s
only one future for me. To go back in the
field. As a double agent, betraying her, her
friends, their contacts... I’d be deadly for
them.
TOM
No disgrace. You’d be serving your country.
PETER
I think that’s what she’s doing. Forgive me,
Tom. I’m with her world, not yours. I won’t
betray her.
A beat. TOM is tense, he can’t read what PETER is going
to do - but he senses something is coming.
PETER
Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?
TOM What?
PETER
Would you give your life to protect what you
believe in?
A silence.
PETER looks at him. There is a wild, almost watery look
in his eyes.
PETER
I would.
TOM is moving but he is a fraction too late. PETER
smashes his forearm across TOM’s throat.
TOM goes crashing to the floor, clutching at his
windpipe, unable to make a sound.
TOM’S POV LEVEL WITH THE FLOOR: PETER is taking off his
trousers very fast in the cubicle.
TOM manages to let out a cry.
GENERAL POV: Men bursting into the loo.
PETER has hanged himself in the cubicle, a trouser leg as
a rope attached the cistern’s pipe, jumping to break his
neck.
TOM lets out a terrible cry of mourning, reaching out to
PETER.
INT. THAMES HOUSE - THE GRID - DAY 3. 1829
HARRY, JOOLS, TOM. HARRY speaking.
HARRY
We know the terrible cost the Service can
wreak on all of us. And how the strongest can
be proved weak because of its demands. There
but for the grace of God go all of us.
At TOM’s station. ZOE is looking at her computer screen,
and whispering to DANNY, over HARRY’s speech.
ZOE
(whispering)
Why bust into a geography Department in a
University, and kill yourself for it?
DANNY
(whispering)
Geography. Names of towns, rivers, valleys
and hills ... It’s mad.
HARRY
But don’t lose sight of the fact this was an
extraordinary operation and a great success.
An entire and potentially dangerous extremist
group, stopped in its tracks. Its leader
facing extradition. Prosecutions at home. And
a point to the public very well made. Very,
very well done.
Claps on the grid but the mood is still uncertain.
HARRY (CONT’D)
Now Jools Siviter will eat his hat.
JOOLS
Well little sisters ... Big sister says ... A
wake for Peter Salter. Free drinks on
Vauxhall Cross, upstairs at the George Head.
Then we can all go out with clear heads
tomorrow to welcome the President of the
United States to our shores. Unmolested by
assorted euro-anarchists.
George Smiley’s wartime superiors described him as having “the cunning of Satan and the conscience of a virgin”. During this time, he met and recruited Dieter Frey, who would go on to become an East German intelligence operative running the intelligence circle that was the main plot point of Le Carré’s first novel, Call for the Dead
In 1943, he was recalled to England to work at Circus headquarters, and in 1945 successfully proposed marriage to Lady Ann Sercomb, a beautiful, aristocratic, and libidinous young lady working as a secretary there. Ann would soon prove herself chronically unfaithful, engaging in numerous affairs and occasionally leaving Smiley entirely, though she always returned to him after the initial excitement of the separation ended. In the same year, Smiley left the Service and returned to Oxford.
However, in 1947, with the onset of the Cold War, Smiley was asked to return to the Service, and in early 1951 moved into counter-intelligence work, where he would remain for the next decade.
It is reported with a reference to the real life Gouzenko affair that “the revelations of a young cipher clerk in Ottawa had created a new demand for men of Smiley’s experience”.
In 1945, Igor Gouzenko, a Soviet cipher at the Soviet embassy in Ottawa, defected and revealed a widespread Soviet spying network in the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada that came as a considerable shock to the leaders of western nations.
During that period, Smiley first met his Soviet nemesis, Karla, in a Delhi prison. Karla proved impossible to crack, though an increasingly desperate Smiley inadvertently revealed his own weakness – his affection for his wife, Ann – during the interrogation.
After he offered Karla the use of his cigarette lighter – a gift from his wife – Karla stole it, keeping it as a symbol of his victory over Smiley.
The incident would continue to haunt Smiley for the remainder of his career.
