‘So you’re saying he did make his own decisions?’
FROGHORN: ‘Of course he did, he was highly qualified, lived by his own rules.’
RUBY: ‘So he was a maverick, a renegade … took authority into his own hands, that sorta thing?’
FROGHORN: ‘No! That’s not what I’m saying, not at all! He never did anything to undermine the agency.’
RUBY: ‘I don’t get it, now you’re telling me he was a zip-it and toe-the-line type of a guy? Make your mind up, Froghorn, either he had guts and initiative or he was just another listen-up-and-do-as-you’re-told team player.’
FROGHORN: ‘The sheer magnitude of what you don’t know about Agent Baker’s guts and heroism would fill this atrium. Baker was an agent in a million.’
RUBY (YAWNING): ‘Yeah, right, so everyone keeps telling me, but it all sounds like a lot of hot air if you want my opinion.’
FROGHORN: ‘No one wants your opinion.’
RUBY: ‘Yeah, and why is that? I’m guessing because no one is tough enough to hear the truth.’
FROGHORN: ‘And what is that “truth”?’
RUBY: ‘Simply that there are other agents just as talented as him.’
Froghorn narrowed his eyes. ‘Are you actually suggesting that you are even close to being in the same league as Agent Baker?’
Ruby made a face to suggest, maybe she was. Froghorn’s reaction was as she’d hoped – very gabby. ‘Come with me,’ he said.
‘Where are we going?’ They were heading in the opposite direction now and Ruby had a job to keep pace with him. When he reached his office he opened the door and waved her in with an irritated gesture.
Her visits to this room were rare and usually very brief, so it wasn’t perhaps so surprising that she had never before noticed how everything was colour-coded, and not just in a Spectrum way, but in a Froghorn way. His calendar for instance: Mondays green, viridian green, Tuesdays yellow. December dark blue.
Froghorn looked like he was wearing a brand-new suit. It was ever so slightly shiny and he had a new shiny steel pen to match; it was attached to a silver cord which hung around his neck. Who does that? she thought. Who actually wears a pen? OK, Mrs Drisco does, but she’s Mrs Drisco, what else would you expect? But this guy should know better. Boy, is he ever a potato head.
FROGHORN: ‘You think that cracking a five-way-thought code which led us to prevent the leaking of secret government dossiers isn’t of value?’
RUBY: ‘Of course it’s of value, I’m just saying, is it remarkable? I mean he was a code cracker, right, so wouldn’t that be all in a day’s work to someone of his agent rank?’
FROGHORN: ‘So how about confronting the Count when he was a junior agent, getting up close and personal with this monster and living to tell the tale? He was the first Spectrum agent to walk away with his life.’
RUBY: ‘What, you mean like I did?’ She studied her nails. ‘More than once actually.’
FROGHORN: ‘You got lucky, little girl, hardly heroic. Baker was captured by the Count and rescued by the Spectrum special agent squad.’
RUBY: ‘I rescued myself, surely that counts for something.’
FROGHORN: ‘State of the art Spectrum gadgets are what allowed you to escape.’
RUBY: ‘Isn’t that how Baker got himself out of trouble a whole bunch of times? I’m sure he would have been toast without the Escape Watch.’
FROGHORN: ‘He was issued with them; you took them without permission.’
RUBY: ‘So that’s the difference between being a hero and not being a hero – a signature on a slip of paper?’
FROGHORN: ‘If you want to be a Spectrum agent then you have to behave like one.’
Ruby had quite a few things she wouldn’t have minded saying in reply to this patronising remark, but was aware that it might not serve her well to get Froghorn so mad that he slammed the door in her face.
RUBY: ‘So name an occasion where Baker actually went above and beyond his job description.’
FROGHORN: ‘You think that leaping from an aircraft without a Spectrum aero-pack in order to save a fellow agent from certain death doesn’t make him a hero?’
RUBY: ‘Can I ask, was the plane moving at the time?’
FROGHORN: ‘Try fourteen thousand feet. And it wasn’t a regular plane.’
Ruby shrugged. ‘I don’t know, Froghorn, I mean, is jumping without a parachute really such a big deal?’
FROGHORN: ‘You should try it sometime.’
RUBY: ‘Maybe I will.’
FROGHORN: ‘I’d be thrilled to arrange it.’
RUBY: ‘If there was actually any evidence that Baker had actually done it then I would be only too happy to give it a try.’
FROGHORN: ‘You should read the files; what’s contained in them would make your head spin.’
RUBY: ‘Oh, so there are files?’
FROGHORN: ‘Of course there are files!’
RUBY: ‘OK, so I’ll read them.’
FROGHORN: ‘You don’t have authority to read files, least of all the Ghost Files.’
RUBY: ‘Ghost Files?’
Silence.
RUBY: ‘Oh, come on, Froghorn, you’re making this up. Ghost Files? I mean Spectrum’s not gonna use a dumb name like that.’
FROGHORN: ‘You know so little of Spectrum. You arrive
