It turns out that “Robert Winters”, Bertrand (River’s doppelganger, whose brain tissue made such a mess of David Cartwright’s bathroom tiles in episode one), the French assassin hunting Sam, and several others really are brothers. They’re products of a one-man stud farm, set up 30-odd years ago in Lavande, presumably to populate the planet with trained killers to do the bidding of their father Frank Harkness (Hugo Weaving). Harkness presided over a harem of impressionable young girls, impregnated them, stole their babies, kicked them out and turned their kids into his own personal army. That makes him Slow Horses’ most unhinged baddie yet, and also, perhaps its most personal.
Ready for some potentially spoilery speculation? Look away now if you don’t want to know the score.
Bertrand’s mother Natasha told River that Harkness had a Eurovision Contest’s worth of baby mamas – some Russians, a Greek, two French locals and an English girl. An English girl named… Cartwright? After all, why make so much of the physical similarities between Bertrand and River if some light isn’t about to be thrown on our lead spook’s shadowy family history. We know that River’s grandparents raised him. We don’t know whether in order to do so, baby River first had to be rescued from his insane cult-leader dad’s compound.
Is that the grudge that Harkness holds for Cartwright Sr and Bad Sam? Or did those two get up to something else back in the day? David Cartwright’s lack of official records at The Park linking him to France is practically a guarantee that he led a since covered-up op there. His dementia may have been pulling the levers when he said that the bomb and the deaths of those poor people were all his fault, but perhaps not. Could there have been two bombs, in two different decades?
Wherever this plot’s going, thank heavens that it brought Jonathan Pryce and Saskia Reeves together for this week’s scenes. His distress, and her patient calculations were beautifully conveyed by the actors, while Morwenna Banks’ script achieved poignancy without losing the sense of humour for which Slow Horses is loved. Standish absorbing Cartwright’s “just a bloody secretary” insult and using it to appease and manage him felt honest, human and true – quite a coup in the middle of such a heightened genre story.
Elsewhere, Weasel Whelan flexed his muscles to recruit Giti for team ‘Take Down Taverner’. I don’t fancy his chances, do you? Kristin Scott Thomas’ wry, dangerous character has seen off lesser opponents while barely breaking a nail, let alone a sweat. She was both missing from this episode, and missed.