The Inquiry. Will Caine

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СКАЧАТЬ father read the letter once quickly, a second time slowly. ‘I see why you’re jumpy.’

      ‘What should I do?’

      ‘What do you want to do?’

      ‘For once I’d like you to tell me.’

      ‘You know I’d never stand in your way.’

      ‘But would you approve?’

      She could feel him trying to read her. ‘You don’t need that, Sara.’ She looked silently down at the floor. ‘See the man. Maybe he’s in trouble, needs help. Maybe it’d be good for you. For your career.’ He handed back the letter.

      She raised her eyes. ‘You’ll promise never, ever even to hint about it to anyone. Anyone at all.’

      ‘Why would I do that? Don’t you trust me?’

      ‘Sorry, Dad, ’course I trust you.’ She felt a burn of shame. ‘It’s just that…’

      ‘I know. It’s… what’s the word? It’s peculiar.’ He inspected her with an unfamiliar curiosity. ‘You’re afraid of something, aren’t you?’ he said.

      It was the enduring sadness within the love she felt for her father – far greater than for any other human being – that made her, even eighteen years later, unable to answer him.

2

      Two days later at 12.55 p.m., Sara Shah arrived at the Afghan restaurant on Farnwood Road, between Tooting High Street and the Common. She’d quickly replied to the letter after discussing it with her father; he’d driven to Chelsea Place Upper that night to put it through No. 45’s front door. She’d ended the note by reminding Morahan, if he cycled, to wear a helmet; after her father set off, she wondered what on earth had possessed her to do so.

      She’d proposed to Morahan a lunchtime meeting – somehow evening felt inappropriate. She was not in court that day and Ludo, as always, had happily agreed to her studying the next case files from home.

      In one corner of the small restaurant, a young Asian family with two toddlers were faces down in a huge plate of sizzling mixed grill and chips. The mother and father showed traces of middle-aged bulge; she imagined the sweet slim little figures with their smooth cheeks and searching eyes going the same way. A jeans-clad boy and high-cheeked girl in a flowing red linen dress and cardigan, laced with a string of glass beads, were ordering; they must have sat down just before her. Pashtuns, she assumed. In the corner a Pakistani man sat alone munching, reading the Mirror.

      Morahan had not replied to her letter; she understood that he must be nervous about communications. Her instincts told her that he would show up, even if it meant cancelling the Palace. They were correct; one minute after the designated time of 1 p.m., a tall figure strode past the window, turned through the door, and cast a wary eye over the restaurant. She rose, saying simply, ‘Hello.’

      ‘Hello,’ he replied. He seemed unsure whether to offer a hand to shake, finally keeping it to himself. Culturally conflicted, she noted. He sat down across the Formica table and buried himself in the menu. He cast a further eye around and behind; none of the other diners caught it.

      She hesitated, wondering whether to test his humour. ‘It’s hardly the Garrick or the Temple.’

      ‘No.’ Expressionless, he peered back down; she couldn’t help noticing the thin prominence of the aquiline nose, with its near-perfect shallow curve. His skin was surprisingly smooth and unblemished for a man of his age; there was no sign of stray hairs emerging from nostrils or ears. His uniformly grey hair flopped elegantly over his collar edge. A good-looking man who had looked after himself. ‘What will you eat?’ he murmured.

      ‘Just a salad, I think.’

      ‘Yes, good.’ He shot another glance at their fellow customers and out of the window. ‘And then perhaps a walk. It seems too good a day to waste.’

      As they made small talk, she tried to remember him as Attorney General but she had then been only in her early teens – try as she might, she couldn’t place his face among the Cabinet of that time. He had a presence, but not that of a showman; she couldn’t imagine him shouting and waving paper about in the Commons.

      He rushed through his salad, a man on edge, itching for open spaces.

      ‘Let me get the bill,’ said Sara.

      ‘No, please…’

      ‘I insist. You have come to me. It’s the least I can do.’

      They stepped outside. ‘I have my bicycle,’ he said.

      ‘Don’t worry, it’ll be here when you return. We’re not the badlands.’

      A few yards down the pavement, he spun abruptly. She followed his eye; the Pakistani man from the restaurant was scurrying into the street. As they turned, he halted and made to study the menu in the window.

      He bent towards her ear, his voice a hiss of panic. ‘It’s not my imagination,’ he said softly. ‘That man is watching us.’

      She grinned. ‘That man is my father.’

      He frowned, then smiled. ‘Oh dear. I feel a fool.’ For the first time, she felt him relax.

      ‘It’s all right, he’s just a little over-protective.’

      ‘I hope my presence is not too alarming.’

      ‘I’ll give him a wave to go home.’ She looked back at her father, shooing him away. ‘He’d make a terrible spy, wouldn’t he?’

      ‘I think perhaps if he wanted to achieve success in that profession, it might only be via the double-bluff.’

      She looked at him; there was a twinkle in his eye. She tested him further. ‘Shall we walk to the Common and find a park bench? Isn’t that what spies do?’

      They sat down, not at a park bench but an outdoor café. Morahan twisted around and, apparently satisfied they were out of ear-shot, leaned towards her.

      ‘Before you begin,’ said Sara, ‘I must ask you a question. This is a public Inquiry. You said in your letter that normally it would be for the Government Legal Department to hire counsel, after discussing it with the Chair of course.’ She lowered her eyes at him. ‘Why the secrecy? Why you alone?’ She paused. ‘And why me?’

      ‘If you allow me to tell you my story, Ms Shah, you will begin to understand.’

       2018 – nine months earlier

      Hooded brown eyes beneath heavy brown brows, familiar to him from television, bore in. ‘I’m going to do this,’ said the Prime Minister. ‘I’m going to find out what went wrong.’

      Francis Morahan had been mystified by both the summons and the secretiveness of the private secretary’s phone call. ‘All I can say, Sir Francis, is that it is to discuss a project close to the PM’s heart, and one which he considers of great importance in advancing the government’s agenda.’ He could hardly refuse the summons but it was more СКАЧАТЬ