While Cartwright dines with a suspected killer and Min’s death is confirmed to be murder, where will our slow horses end up this week?
Rebecca tells Lamb she got a call to come to a car park, where a man was waiting for her. We see a memory of her standing in the shadows as the Russian man sends Min home on his bike, telling him to be careful. The second Russian man appears and chokes Min, before a third man uses Rebecca’s car to hit Min. Chernitsky himself then used a spiked ring to finish Min off, no doubt the same ring he used on Dickie’s arm.
The Russians then piled Min and his bike into a van and staged the crime scene, complete with Rebecca taking the fall. Now that Rebecca has told Lamb the truth, she asks him for help to protect her from the Russians. Lamb gives her a number to call, but knowing Lamb it will be for his favorite noodle restaurant.. and sure enough, it is. Predictable on Lamb’s part, but funny.
Cartwright and Chernitsky pleasantly ask each other about their business and travel at the family dinner table. Chernitsky asks what River has discovered about the village so far and asks if he’s undercover in a lighthearted way. When the men are left alone at the table, they joke like old friends and not the spies they all know they are.
Louisa prepares for the oligarch meeting and ends up sitting at a bar with the man she met the previous day. The two have a casual conversation over drinks and Louisa shares she doesn’t want to die in Slough House like Lamb will. She wants to make something of herself and get out. The conversations turns to Min, and Louisa says his death isn’t as it seems.
Lamb slips into the “language school” again to investigate the connection to Min’s death. He sorts through records, files and papers. While there, the phone rings – and the message is for Lamb. Katinsky was watching him, and knows he’s going through the office. He confesses the day arrived when his former KGB bosses asked for help, and he did so as that was their agreement long ago. Before he hangs up, Katinsky tells Lamb his job was to distract him while the KGB did something else. When Lamb gets downstairs, Katinsky has vanished.
Lamb rushes back to Slough House and calls a meeting. He informs Catherine that Chernitsky murdered Min, and shares the info Rebecca told him. Catherine questions whether they should tell Diana, but Lamb doesn’t want her to take the case off him. Lamb shares that Rebecca picked up her payment for her role in Min’s murder from Katinsky’s language school. Roddy tells Lamb where Lin cycled the day he died, but nothing stands out immediately.
Back at the dinner party, “Leo” gets ready to leave. He tells Cartwright he’s sure he’s seen him somewhere before. As he leaves, Kelly asks River what’s going on. She can see he and Chernitsky know each other, but River tries to tell her that Chernitsky just confused him with someone else. She doesn’t buy it, and Cartwright takes off after Chernitsky’s car so he can get the plate.
Lamb arrives at the Russian import/export business that Min trailed the men to before he died. He questions the young man at the desk about the box the men picked up the day before, but he feigns no knowledge of the Russians. Meanwhile, River calls Roddy and tells him he slipped his service phone into Chernitsky’s pocket, which allows Roddy to track his location. River ditches his own phone and goes after Chernitsky alone, much to the confusion of Kelly.
Catherine erases a signature from one of Victor Krymov’s MI5 documents, and calls him to get him to meet her under the guise of re-doing the signature. She meets him at his place in the city and he happily signs the document again before she questions him about his associates. He tries to get Catherine to drink with him, but she declines. He says he will not tell her what she wants unless she does, and Catherine has to make the hard choice between her sobriety or gaining the knowledge she seeks.
Lamb and Shirley look into Nievsky. The two bicker before going to check out Nievsky’s place, but it looks like someone has beaten them there. The gate keypad is busted and the door to the house wide open. They find two dead men with gunshot wounds and quickly check through the rest of the house, but the assailants are gone. Beside the pool lays a folder of documents and a syringe. Shirley finds Nievsky’s dead body, and Lamb recognizes a radioactive sensor. Nievsky is missing a thumb, which will no doubt he used by his attackers to open something important.
Lamb and Catherine trade current information, and their new goal is working out what Katinsky wants. Meanwhile, Marcus grabs Louisa just as she’s about to make the stupid choice of going to her new Russian friend’s hotel room. She tells Marcus she intended to interrogate then kill Pashkin as she thinks Pashkin is the one responsible for Min’s death. Marcus rightfully points out that Louisa has gone off the deep end, and calls Lamb. Louisa takes the phone and Lamb tells Louisa that Pashkin did not kill Min, but he most likely ordered the hit – along with Nievsky. Lamb orders Louisa to stand down and go to the meeting tomorrow as planned.
Cartwright catches Chernitsky at the airfield – surprisingly, Katinsky is with him. Kelly’s mother, Alex, appears from nowhere and the three attempt to gaslight River into thinking he’s got it all wrong, that Chernitsky and Katinsky are simply planning a surprise for Kelly’s father. While he’s focuses on the men, Alex gets close enough to use a taser on Cartwright’s neck. Once again, Cartwright gets himself in trouble by going rogue and not waiting for backup. What will become of him next week?
