Chris Morehouse is a contract agent for the CIA.
This is not unusual since the Agency makes use of a lot of contract workers to provide great deniability. Morehouse is a bit different in that he is a British citizen. But as he shows when we first meet him, the man has terrific instincts, impressive powers of observations, and very, very nice reflexes. This not only helps him stay alive in nasty situations, it helps immensely keeping those he is protecting alive and helps him pull off some quite difficult missions.
When we first meet him, Morehouse is "an FSN driver for the U.S. motor pool in Berlin", that is, a "foreign service national" or someone from the local economy hired for a job by the State Department in a foreign country.
In the case of Morehouse, he is "an unemployed and out-of-luck foreigner (British in this instance) in Germany" who had "simply responded, without any real forethought, to an advertisement for a driver in a newspaper he had picked up on a train in Cologne one day".
"He had been stationed in Germany with the British Army and decided not to return to the UK when his term of service was complete. As an independent-minded twenty-six-year-old, he thought he'd be happier managing his life the way that he wanted, away from the pub culture of moderate-income British society." After an interview, he got the job as a motor pool drive in the US embassy in Bonn. "What happened shortly thereafter changed his life forever. Chris was soon recruited by the Mission Consulting Services (MCS), one of a myriad of internal departments that litter all US embassies around the world."
"A certain Mr. Nash began using Chris as a regular driver that he began to sense a difference in the people he was shuttling around. They were generally quiet people but exuded power-and they seemed to like Chris's unassuming yet careful manner. Before long, MCS formally requested Chris's full-time services from the motor pool, and after a few months, Chris began working for the department on a permanent basis. He was neither stupid, nor naive, yet it still took Chris a few months to figure out he was working for the CIA - albeit indirectly."
After our introduction to him, Morehouse will become a wee bit more than just a driver for the CIA.
Good Lines:
- Regarding his initial job as a driver of important people: "The easiest way to kill a VIP while in transit was to stop the car. What was the easiest way to stop a car with a VIP? Kill the driver! As such, Chris's self-preservation took priority in all matters of safety."