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‘Oh?’
‘Yeah, easier, know what I mean?’
‘Yes,’ she said with soft sympathy, ‘I know exactly what you mean, Sami.’
She sipped her cup of tea and looked happily at him, waiting. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘What’s this all about?’
‘Just want to ask you a few questions for the survey,’ she said.
‘Survey?’
‘Yes. Governments do them all the time. All anonymous. Just trying to find out what people think of their lives, what can be done to improve them, what their experiences have been.’
‘Sounds all right.’
‘Shall I start?’ Sara laid the clipboard on her lap and began a list of questions with multiple choice answers. She’d designed it to be innocuous without sounding pointless – ranges of satisfaction or dissatisfaction over dealings with employers, council officials, education service and the like. Ten minutes or so in, she came to the final question. Omitting it would appear odd – it might also provide clues.
‘OK, Sami, last one. The police.’
‘Police?’
‘Yes. Can’t leave them out, can we?’ Was there an anxious flicker of the eye or did she imagine it? If there was, it lasted just a millisecond. He was either sufficiently settled not to bridle further or cool enough not to react.
She went through the choices. Number of dealings over the past five years: 0, 1–5, 6–10…
‘Can’t say I’ve really had any,’ he said shortly.
‘OK. In that case, that’s it,’ she said.
‘You mean we’re done.’
‘Yes.’ She began to rise.
‘No hurry. Have another cup of tea.’
She sank back and sighed. ‘Are you sure? Your mum won’t mind?’
‘Nah.’
Sami disappeared with the tray into the kitchen. Sara wasn’t sure whether he was lonely or looking for female company. Maybe, now that he appeared to trust her, she was a break from boredom. What, in any case, was she hoping to find? The trail that had led her to his door stemmed from something in his past twelve years ago. Without knowing what it was, she couldn’t tell whether what had attracted the surveillance had even been noteworthy to Samir himself. He might simply have been an innocent link in a chain.
He swaggered in with a refilled teapot and, this time, cake.
‘Mum insisted. She’s always baking cakes. Watching too much Nadiya, I reckon.’
‘I won’t be able to move!’
‘You’ll need stamina.’ He poured tea and looked at her awkwardly. ‘You do this all the time?’
‘No, just part-time,’ she said. ‘But it can be interesting. You get to know people. Sometimes they have stories to tell you wouldn’t believe. You know, like, in this one we’re looking at how Muslims are treated here and everything that’s happened. ’Course, I treat everything in confidence but sometimes I can really help people.’
‘Is that right? What sort of things?’
Sara looked at him as if she were in deep thought – buying time to calculate how far to push it. ‘I can’t say details of what people told me privately. But… you know… bad things happened. Sometimes there’s a need to tell someone…’
He stared down at his hands, slowly rubbing them together. ‘Yeah, suppose they did.’ Maybe her prior knowledge was influencing her but she sensed a memory floating by him. She held the silence, hoping he would fill it. He looked up. ‘Yeah well, stuff happens, don’t it?’ Then no more. Closure. Any further pushing could clam him up completely. She mustn’t show disappointment. She quickly drained her cup of tea.
‘That was lovely, Sami, thanks so much. And so nice to meet you.’
‘You going?’ She detected disappointment.
‘Yes, better get back to it.’ He rose too. ‘I’ll be here for another couple of days if you fancy another tea. My treat this time.’
‘Dunno what I’m doing.’
Sara pulled a card from one of two sets in her handbag. It read, ‘Sara Shah. Market researcher.’ And a mobile number.
He read it quickly. ‘Yeah, OK.’
‘Give me a ring if you’d like to meet up.’ She gave him the most intense look she dared. ‘Be good to see you again.’ Quickly she pulled back and smiled. ‘Will you thank your mum for me?’
‘Yeah.’ He came to the door as she walked back onto the pavement. So great was the combination of expectation and frustration that she only remembered just in time that she was a market researcher knocking on every tenth number of Gent Street. He was still watching as she pressed the bell of No. 69. Reaching the end of the street, she chanced a final look-back. No sign of him. Or anyone else.
The car drew alongside as she turned the corner.
‘Well?’
‘Hang on a minute.’ She settled herself in her seat, fastened the belt, and foraged in her bag for her make-up mirror as he moved off down the street. She removed it and checked her face, applying tiny pats of powder. Buying time again.
This was going to be impossible unless, to some extent at least, she levelled with him, whatever the wariness now infecting her. What was there to lose anyway? He could see that she had case histories – it would be perverse not to share. To test trust, maybe you had to give it.
‘OK. Morahan gave me some files.’
‘That was pretty obvious, Sara.’
‘Was it that bad?’ She remembered his expression. ‘Did you have a peek in the folder when I was with Sylvia?’
He slapped his foot on the brake and pulled in to the roadside. ‘For f— Sorry, I’ll start that again. What do you take me for?’
She was consumed by embarrassment, wanting to tell him about the text so that he’d understand. She mustn’t. Not till she really knew him – if she ever did. And still that horrible, sinking feeling – what if he was the one she had to look out for?
‘I’m sorry, Patrick.’
He softened. ‘It’s OK. Go on.’
‘I don’t know where they came from, MI5, Special Branch, your guess is as good as mine.’ The half-truth was weak; she needed to be better at this. ‘They relate to five young Muslims with family addresses in Blackburn. Two appear to have been closed by the end of 2006.’
‘2006? Long time ago.’
‘Yes. But the other three remained open.’
‘And one of the five lived, or lives, in Gent Street.’
‘I found him. He was at home. Still lives with his mum. I could hardly believe it. I finally got inside…’
‘Well done.’
‘I had to use a last resort.’
‘Oh?’
‘Used fivers.’
Patrick frowned. ‘How many?’
‘Actually, more like twenties. Ten of them.’ Though he said nothing, Patrick’s eyebrows shot up. ‘He’s smart,’ she continued. ‘Greedy too. He’d never have done it for nothing.’
He was silent for a few seconds. ‘Good call,’ he finally said. ‘I’ll find a way of putting it through the books.’
She felt her shoulders sag with relief. ‘I didn’t feel especially proud of myself. Anyway, he warmed up, Mum was friendly, tea on saucers, he did the survey. I could see he liked the look of me.’
‘Of course.’
She lowered her eyes. ‘Didn’t want me to go. We chatted more. Then I truly thought he might just be about to cough something.’
‘But he didn’t.’
‘No. Don’t know why he baulked. Or what I did.’
‘Stop beating yourself. You did well to get that far.’
She winced. ‘I left him my number. But I think he’s slipped the hook. So onto the next.’
He was circling streets with no particular aim, listening. ‘No,’ he said. ‘You’ve had a bite. These neighbourhoods are chatty. You carry on walking their streets and word will get around about you and your survey. Not bad words, just words. Give it twenty-four hours. Stay out of sight and mind.’
‘Won’t it be time wasted?’
‘I’ve a better idea. Fancy climbing a hill?’ Without awaiting her reply, he put his foot on the accelerator and sped without exceeding the limit too blatantly in the direction of the Savoy Inn.
She wondered why he hadn’t asked to see the actual files – it was such an obvious request. The good manners to wait until she offered? Or a man who knew how to bide his time?
Sami Mohammed, concealed inside the porch, watched until she turned the corner. She reached the end of the street quickly. Either there really was no one in at the further ten doors she’d approached or she hadn’t bothered to ring any bells.
Who was she? Why had she seemed so desperate to get into his house? The old terror was creeping back. Was she part of them, testing him out? Or part of something else, wanting to rake over the coals? Perhaps embers still flickered and, even now, the fire hadn’t gone out. He went inside, closed the door, and shot upstairs to his bedroom, bypassing the inquisitive stare of his mother.
He retrieved from its hiding place in his chest the card they’d left with him. Time froze as he stared at it – plain, three by two inches, now yellowed at the corners with a crease down the middle like the depression in an old man’s back. On it a number, nothing more. The threat that came with it didn’t need to be written down – he’d never forget it. ‘If anyone ever starts asking questions, anyone at all, anytime at all, even years ahead, phone this. You don’t, you’re dead.’
He tried to work out the risks. If she’d been sent by them – what the reason might be this many years later he couldn’t begin to fathom – he could end up dead meat if he didn’t at least try to phone it. If she’d come from someone trying to go after them, he could still end up dead if he didn’t warn them.
Or, if she was what she said she was, he’d do better to let things lie. Reflecting on it, he became ever more sure that she wasn’t. It was as if she’d wanted him to suspect – know even – that she was more than she first seemed.
She’d wanted him to spill something.
Even thinking of those times – the times leading up to when he’d been given that little card and the lifetime warning – made his guts churn and his pulse quicken.
He picked up his phone.
He didn’t expect the call to be answered so fast.
6 (#ulink_768b7476-9cce-5bbd-8fe7-28116f7410b6)
2006
Wherever they were headed, it wasn’t Paradise.
5.30 a.m. He’d done morning prayers and lay in bed dozing. From his bedroom at the back of the house he heard a low whistle – his friend, Asif. He drew back the curtain and saw a familiar gesture of arms bidding him to the front. Asif up to some trick or other. Or in trouble, more likely. He had to go – couldn’t let him down.
He sprayed deodorant all over, threw on jeans, T-shirt and a long-sleeved black sweater, put a comb through black hair and fledgling beard, salve on cracked lips, sports socks inside black trainers. He checked his watch. He stood up to his full six feet two inches, inspected himself in the mirror, clenched his mouth to examine uneven teeth, grabbed a brush to use later, felt wallet and small change in the left trouser pocket, stuffed brush and comb into the right, puffed out his chest.
He eased the bedroom door open, flicking a glance across the landing, and silently closed it. He tiptoed around the squeaky floorboard and, at the top of the stairs, heard the familiar rhythm of his father wheezing. He inched down, lifted his black leather coat from its peg in the hallway and touched his phone and house keys. Everything present and correct for whatever Asif had in store. Ready to go.
He slotted a key into the front door lock and turned it. A squeak from the floor above; he froze. No footsteps – perhaps it was a groan from the depths of sleep. It made him hesitate – ask himself why Asif needed him at this hour. In all the years they’d known each other, he’d never called this early. He’d have liked to turn round, to climb back to the warmth of his bed, to sleep and dream. He jettisoned the thought; it was a friend in need. He prised the door ajar and there was the grinning face, the arms outstretched.
‘Hey, man,’ he whispered, ‘what’s it about this time?’
‘It’s a summons,’ his friend whispered back. They crept through the open front gate onto the pavement, the night still dark, a street lamp casting misty light on a whining milk cart further down the street.
‘What you mean, a summons?’ He looked at Asif; there was something not right, a glint of fear in his eyes.
Before there was time for an answer, his friend pulled away. Two figures in dark hoodies ranged alongside, clamping his arms and forcing him across the road.
‘Hey, what the—’
‘Shut it, brother, I’m just the escort,’ snarled one, gagging his mouth with a black leather glove.
Sami turned his head and glimpsed Asif watching, the fear now tinged with regret. Did he hear his voice? ‘Sorry, man.’ Or did he just imagine it as his friend disappeared into the dawn gloom?
He was alone, outnumbered, unarmed, not even a knife. He thought of screaming. They saw it; the black-gloved fist slapped into his mouth. They pushed him into the windowless back of a small van; one leapt inside with him, the other locked the door. Imprisoned. Even if he overpowered his ‘escort’, there was no way out.
‘What’s this about, brother? I ain’t done nothing,’ he mumbled.
He heard the second man’s footsteps circle the van, a door slam, the engine fire up, a jerk of acceleration pitching him against the carcass of steel.
The escort – his jailer, more like – pointed to his pocket and beckoned with a finger to hand over what was in it.
‘What you want?’
The escort, staying silent, beckoned again. Sami feigned puzzlement. The response was a kick in the shin. Understanding, he handed over his mobile. He was allowed to keep his watch.
