It might seem a strange thing to write, but there is a moment in this scene, from ‘The Chimes of Big Ben, when Number 6 appears almost to be Number 2’s assistant! The precise moment comes when Number 2 and Number 6 are watching a new arrival waking up in what she thinks is her home, only to discover she is in The Village. Its difficult to put my finger on, even more difficult to explain in words. It’s in the way the two men interact, and seem to be at ease with each other at that moment.
They are certainly relaxed with each other, there is most certainly a rapport between the two men. And yet they are complete opposites, the one being the Prisoner and the other the Prisoner’s keeper. And yet they are both Prisoners, lifers as Number 2 once put it.
At the commencement of the episode it is suggested, not stated, that Number 2 has an assistant, the former manager of the Labour Exchange. Number 2 seems to be a highly competent and able fellow, not in need of any assistance. Perhaps that’s why his assistant, who made the suggestion that there are methods they haven’t used yet, meaning against Number 6, saw him spend the rest of his time in the Control Room!
Well of course it didn’t work. Number 2 had apparently told them they were using the wrong approach. So perhaps next time this Number 2 will have to employ one of their methods not yet used, something of an extreme measure perhaps!
Footnote: The cup and saucer used in ‘The Chimes of Big Ben’ from which Number 2 and Number 6 drink their tea, is not Portmeirion pottery, but Crown Derby. However Number 2 doesn’t actually drink his tea, perhaps he prefers coffee, after all that is a silver Georgian coffee pot the tea is poured from. A bit of a faux pas that, by the Butler!
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