The Truth (30 page)

He picked up the manuscript.

‘They’ve given us a one-week extension.’

‘Who are “they”?’

‘“
They
” are my board. “
They
” pay my wages. And yours!’

His voice dropped.

‘Keith. I
need
those facts in there. You said to me yourself that a journalist will always look for the truth. Don’t resist it, Keith, when it’s under your nose. You’re a good writer, now prove that you’re a good journalist.’

There was, of course, only one person who could definitively scotch the Trickett allegations, and that was the one person Mabbut had agreed not to contact directly. But if he was to have any chance of saving the book as he had written it, he realised he had no option.

He called Wendy Lu at her number in Singapore. She greeted him with her usual infectious enthusiasm, and before he could say anything she had launched into a panegyric about the book, a copy of which had reached her less than a week ago and which she had immediately sent on to Melville. Mabbut felt compelled to tell her everything that had developed since then. At first Wendy tried to laugh off Trickett’s accusations, but it was clear from the increasing silences that she was taking it all in. When Mabbut had finished she was all briskness and efficiency, asking for clarification on certain points, such as dates when things had happened and the people who had brought this information to Urgent Books. She promised to contact Melville and said she’d get back to Mabbut with an explanation. Mabbut made it as clear as he could how important it was that he learnt the truth from the man himself. His personal access to Melville was still his trump card.

Tuesday and Wednesday came and went. In addition to Rex’s testimony, Mabbut re-interviewed his other contacts, none of whom could recollect any dealings between Melville and Trickett. He spent a day at the Patent Office, painstakingly checking for any submissions Trickett might have made. Trickett had indeed been a fertile
inventor and his name appeared, often with that of his wife, on a number of applications, mainly to do with medical equipment, but there was no mention of bileaflet valves. Interestingly there had been no applications from him for anything since the mid-1980s.

The rest of the week did not go well. Daily calls from Ron Latham and nothing at all from Melville. Silla Caldwell was uncharacteristically elusive. All he got from her hotel in Madrid were brusque assurances that his messages had been received. On Friday afternoon, an old, rather grubby envelope arrived in the post. It seemed to have been reused several times. Inside was a single sheet of notepaper headed ‘Lees Hall’ and a short message which appeared to have been composed on a very old typewriter. It read, ‘
Dear Sir, I have remembered the name of the man who first spoke to me about Bettina. It was a Mr Latham. Yours faithfully, V. R. Trickett
.’

Mabbut felt paralysed, caught between his desire to be done with the book and have his fee safely banked, and his increasing suspicion that he was being deliberately manipulated by Latham and Urgent to distort the truth. Nevertheless, the very existence of Trickett and Ursula had shaken him and sown doubt where none had existed before.

At home, there were other doubts creeping in. Mabbut had been hurt more than he’d expected by the news that Krystyna and Rex’s relationship was not only alive and well but seemed to be cementing itself around some formless mistrust of his daughter’s choice of boyfriend. This only made him more thankful that he had found the money to help Shiraj and his family, and determined to find more if necessary. He knew that Krystyna wouldn’t like it, but that was one of the differences between them. He saw duties; she saw practicalities.

It was now Saturday and Mabbut was sitting, stock still, in front of his computer, staring at the back of the house opposite where what had once been a messy green garden had now become a neat paved patio, on which a circular drying device slowly rotated. The doorbell sounded. He walked downstairs. At the door was a young man in well-pressed overalls holding a small computer terminal. Behind him a delivery van was double-parked in the street. A car behind it hooted angrily, but the young man seemed in no hurry. He handed
over an envelope and requested Mabbut’s signature. Mabbut signed, bade him farewell, and was already tearing the envelope open as he pushed the door shut with his foot.

To his relief and joy, it was from Melville. At last. Handwritten, as before, on old Foreign Office notepaper. With a surge of relief, he took it up to his workroom, shut the door carefully and sat down to read.

Keith, greetings
.

Wendy sent me the book. I’m afraid I could only speed-read it on my way to South America, but it looked pretty good to me. I skipped most of the stuff about my early days but appreciated the space you gave to my more mature work (!) and our time in India (I’ve suggested a few trims of the more personal stuff. Do I really ‘bark orders’?) But by and large I’m happy and I congratulate you on an impossible task well executed. This story could make a difference, believe me
.

Saw Kumar before I left. He sends his best
.

Hamish M

Mabbut turned over the paper. The other side was blank. He peered into the envelope, running his finger deep inside. It was empty. He looked for an indication of date or place but there was neither.

He checked his watch. It was four o’clock. It would be 11 p.m. in Singapore. He took a deep breath and dialled Wendy’s personal number. It was on answer. He left a message, impressing on her as strongly as he could the vital need for up-to-date information from Melville. He had just finished when he was distracted by a shout from downstairs. He opened the door and looked over the banister. Jay had come in. She sounded anxious.

‘Have you seen Shiraj, Dad?’

Mabbut shook his head. ‘Not since this morning.’

‘It’s odd. He doesn’t usually go out without me. And his bag’s not here.’

‘He’s probably gone to the shops. Or on one of his marathons.’

‘We always go running together.’

‘Have you rung his mobile?’

She nodded. ‘No answer.’

You and me both, Mabbut thought. And for once his tolerance of Melville’s lifestyle tipped over into irritation. He might be saving tribes from extinction but why this obsession with being reclusive? How difficult could it be to make one phone call, for God’s sake?

‘I’m sure he’ll be back,’ he shouted down, automatically.

Jay didn’t reply. He heard her go back into the kitchen. He returned to his workroom and sat staring out at the back gardens again. A pigeon clumsily manoeuvred about his hedge, beak full, looking for a nesting site. He banged on the window and it flew away.

The sound of the phone made him jump. He picked it up quickly but then his heart sank. It was Ron Latham, and worse still, he sounded happy.

‘How’s the writing going?’

‘Fine,’ Mabbut lied.

‘I have some very good news!’

‘Oh?’

‘Our picture desk has tracked down some shots of Trickett, his wife and our man together.’

‘Melville?’

‘We’re pretty sure it’s him. It’s a formal photograph at some function. Circa 1980. Resolution’s not great but we’re working on that.’

‘I thought you said that Trickett’s name wouldn’t come out.’

‘We don’t have to say who he is.’

‘But everyone will be able to see him. That’s not what you promised him.’

‘Whatever my boys promised him is their affair. I’m a publisher. I have a book to sell. And it’s your book too, remember that.’

‘That’s why I’m worried.’

‘Well, don’t be. This is just what we need. The camera doesn’t lie.’

Unlike you, thought Mabbut.

‘Oh, and we sent someone over to that Czech place I can’t pronounce—’

‘Karlovy Vary?’

‘That’s it. So now we have an eye-catching choice of pictures to
go with your stuff on the daughter. She’s a handsome woman, Keith. Did you get a free massage?’

‘Ron, I don’t know what’s going on here. She had nothing to say. There’s no story there! And as for Trickett, I think he was told what to say.’

‘Come on, Keith, let’s not get into your paranoia. Just put what Trickett told you in the book, and let the reader judge for himself.’

Mabbut was aware of a mounting anger, desperately trying to find somewhere to settle.

‘And the photographs?’

Latham was trying to sound relaxed, but his voice was high pitched and brittle.

‘They’re part of a very full book. There’s a lot of other stuff in there. Some people may not even notice them.’

‘Which is why you want to put the photos in, I suppose. Ron, you know as well as I do that this stuff is exactly what the papers, the media, will pick up on. They’re not going to be interested in Indian or Brazilian tribes he’s saved from extinction. If there’s a picture of a beautiful blonde outside a health club that’s what they’ll print. And once Melville has been discredited by association then anyone who wants to do some good in the world is going to find it that much harder. Is that really what you want?’

‘Look, no one’s talking about discrediting anyone. It’s about bringing in the widest audience.’

He heard Latham clear his throat.

‘Monday morning, Keith. Full meeting of the board. I have to show them what we’ve got. This is our last chance. Finish the story the way they want it and have it with me by Sunday night, or the deal is off.’

Mabbut lowered the phone. He felt his heart thumping. This was turning into a nightmare. Everything he had feared from the first moment he’d set eyes on Ron Latham was coming true. He was slipping into a morass and he had no idea how to climb out of it. He pulled the window open and took some deep breaths. He had walked into this unholy deal with his eyes wide open, believing somehow that goodness was irreducible. That what Melville stood for was as near as humanly possible to what everyone should want to
stand for. Now it had come to this. Melville was a good man about to be mugged. And he was one of the muggers.

He called Silla in Madrid. This time he didn’t even bother to leave a message. Then he returned to his desk and stared out of the window until the dark clouds came and the light began to fade, and finally he set himself to the unwelcome task.

It was thoroughly unpleasant work. Having originally written the book in the spirit of Orwell and Norman Lewis, he was finishing it in the style of a Sunday newspaper in a circulation battle.

After an hour or two his motivation evaporated. He persisted but eventually set it aside, shut his laptop and went downstairs. No sign of Jay or Shiraj. The house that had once given him so much comfort now felt cold and inhospitable, as if it too disapproved of what he was doing. He looked around him. He hadn’t bothered to switch the lights on. All he felt now was an overwhelming desire to be somewhere else. He picked up the phone and called Tess.

EIGHT

M
abbut awoke with a sense of foreboding. Grey daylight drizzled in through half-drawn curtains. He eased himself out of bed, gathered his things and was out of the flat before Tess woke. There was little traffic on the road, and he half walked, half ran along the slumbering back streets till he found a twenty-four-hour corner store on Hornsey Rise. He bought a pint of milk and some orange juice and jogged back to Reserton Road, where he unlocked the front door and entered the house as soundlessly as possible.

He held his breath. The house felt different. He went upstairs and on to the landing. Jay’s bedroom door was open, so he looked inside. The bed was tidy and hadn’t been slept in and the curtains were open.

‘Jay!’ he called as he went downstairs.

There was no answer.

So they’d both been out for the night. He felt hungry all of a sudden. Hungry for something very basic. Bacon, egg, sausage, anything bad. He walked into the kitchen, taking out his mobile to see whether there had been any word from Singapore. Nothing. Instead he found two missed calls from the previous night, both from Krystyna. That was unusual enough to raise a ray of hope.

Finding, to his disgust, that there were none of the high-cholesterol ingredients he craved, he made himself a large mug of coffee and a tomato sandwich then, checking the time, he called his wife.

‘There you are!’

Never a promising start to a conversation.

‘Where have you
been
?’ she asked.

‘In bed. Asleep.’

There was the briefest of pauses.

‘It’s Jay . . .’

His stomach lurched. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Her little Muslim friend.’

‘Shiraj? What’s happened to him?’

‘You’d better come over. We’re at Rex’s flat. Fifteen Wilton Gardens. Knightsbridge.’

Mabbut grabbed his phone, keys and wallet and ran out into the street. Sunday morning. No cars, let alone a taxi. Maintenance work on the Underground. He ran back inside and dialled the local minicab firm. A polite, incurious Somali got him down to Wilton Gardens in twenty minutes.