Never Tell

by Seeber, Claire

  ‘Just because, Rose. He’s wanted for far bigger things. And James was stupid, he was tempted by greed and desperation. He should have stayed away from them. It was always going to be bad business.’

  ‘Are you saying James did it?’ I whispered.

  Danny shrugged. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I don’t know what I think, Danny. Or – or whoever you are. I don’t know anything any more.’

  ‘Listen, Rose. There’s nothing I can do to help him. He might get off, there’s a chance. But I swear, it was nothing to do with me; our paths just happened to cross. I’ve told them what I know, and the rest is down to the court. And I know I did the wrong thing with you, and I’m sorry for that. I swear.’ He hugged me. ‘I should never have come near you, Rose.’

  He pulled me close and I clung to him. I knew he had betrayed me, but for a moment I clung on like my life depended on it. He kissed me once, on the lips, and this time he felt hot. His skin was hot, and somewhere, faintly, the lemon sherbet tasted bitter-sweet.

  ‘I shouldn’t have come near you,’ he murmured into my hair. Then he opened the door. ‘I shouldn’t – but I had to.’

  ‘Danny,’ I said urgently, and he turned. ‘What’s your name? Your real name?’

  ‘They call me Cal.’

  ‘Cal?’

  ‘I was born on the banks of the river Callendar.’ He smiled at me. I’d so rarely seen him smile. ‘That’s where we stayed. My family. Ma was a bit poetic, you see. Just call me Cal.’

  And then he was gone. Somewhere deep inside, my instincts screamed; I knew I’d never see him again.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  ‘That fucking barrister,’ Liam kept saying. ‘Fucking ugly bitch.’

  I clinked the ice around my glass, round and round it went. I tried to concentrate on Liam’s words as a group of laughing men came through the pub door. I turned abruptly at the sound of a Scottish accent. It wasn’t him; of course it wasn’t. Danny was long gone. I bit my lip hard. The pain took my mind off him for about a minute.

  ‘It was a fucking set-up, James was right,’ Liam was slurring in the background. ‘They fucking massacred me. That fucking bitch barrister made it sound like we’re just a pair of lightweights messing around with drugs and ravers.’ Liam slammed his glass down on the table and almost missed; it nearly fell onto the floor. ‘How fucking dare she?’

  ‘What did you expect?’ I said wearily, pushing the glass safely home.

  ‘I don’t know. Not that. Poor bloody James. I can’t believe how shit this all is.’ Liam clutched my hand. He was drunk, really drunk. He swayed forward alarmingly, until gently I pushed him back. ‘He’s going to get off, Rose, I know it. He’ll be home soon.’

  I patted his hand. ‘Let’s hope so, lovely. Let’s hope so.’

  * * *

  The next day they called Saquib Baheev to the stand. I sat in the public gallery, thanking God for the small mercy of Kate’s mother not being here today, of her reproachful gaze. I listened as Saquib insisted he’d only done what he had been told, according to him: meeting people, couriering, driving for the Kattans. It all sounded very respectable at first.

  ‘I’m not trying to say I’m blameless, yeah? But I was just a soldier, right? Nadif, he was the man. I did do a bit of heavy stuff for him, for my sins.’

  I sat up, alert suddenly. Trying but failing to win the jury over, Saquib blamed the entire thing on a man called Nadif Mosa: he was the mastermind, apparently.

  ‘The boss’s daughter’s boyfriend. He infiltrated the family through poor Maya.’ Saquib tried an eyebrow-raise that meant Women, eh? ‘Well clever, that one. Fooled us all.’

  Nadif. Maya’s boyfriend, who had died. The man I’d seen Saquib smash down in the gravel. He was obviously lying.

  ‘And what happened to Nadif Mosa, Mr Baheev?’

  Baheev made another ill-judged attempt at conspiracy with the jury. He was not an attractive proposition right now, sweating and nervous, a false smile like a tic that he kept flashing at them in some kind of delusional hope. They stared blankly at him.

  ‘Let’s just say it ain’t wise to get high on your own supply. Know what I’m saying?’

  ‘Meaning?’ The barrister was brusque.

  ‘Meaning he majorly overdosed, yeah?’

  This was borne out by a written statement from the coroner, and the court was adjourned for lunch before Baheev was questioned about James. I thought I’d better tell Ruth what I knew about Nadif, but she was nowhere to be found. I felt really shaky today; my appetite was shot and I’d hardly slept. Facts that made no sense pursued one another relentlessly round my head. I wished desperately that Danny were here; I wished desperately that I could stop thinking of him. He wouldn’t be the answer, I had to remember that.

  Outside in the street, I leaned on the railing, glancing down the road. A group of barristers checked their BlackBerrys and smoked by the revolving doors, their robes flapping out behind them like clipped crows’ wings. Beyond them, a woman was on the phone beneath an elm tree. I looked again as she put her hand up for a black cab.

  ‘Excuse me.’ I began to walk towards her.

  She was getting in the cab now, still on the phone.

  ‘Wait.’ I was hurrying now. ‘Please, wait …’ But too late. The cab was pulling off now into the busy lunch-time traffic.

  I was sure it was Maya Kattan.

  Slowly I walked back to the Old Bailey. Ruth was waiting for me outside the courtroom. She looked slightly feverish.

  ‘Something’s happened.’ She took my arm. ‘They’re adjourning the trial.’

  ‘What? Why?’

  ‘Some kind of new evidence has come to light.’

  ‘What does that mean?’ I was confused.

  Was it my imagination, or was there a strange light in her eyes?

  ‘I don’t know. All I know right now is they’re adjourning the case for a few days.’ She clutched my arm. ‘Keep everything crossed for your poor husband.’

  ‘I am,’ I smiled shakily. ‘Believe me, I am.’

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  The moon was a chalk circle etched on the pale sky as I walked through the dusky city. Dodging tourists still snapping St Paul’s, I felt confused and washed out. My exhaustion was immense. At least now, I thought, trying to fix on a bright spot, at least I can go back to my parents and be with the kids. We might have to wait some more, but at least it’s nearly over.

  Outside Jen’s flat, I was searching for the doorkey when my mobile rang.

  ‘Hello? Rose Langton?’ a creaky voice asked. ‘I saw you on the news at lunch-time. It jogged my memory.’

  ‘Sorry,’ I couldn’t place her, ‘who is this?’

  ‘I found something a while back, but I have to be honest, it’s been sitting in the in-tray.’ Peggy from Cutting Out. ‘Getting a bit forgetful, if I’m honest. You’ll have to come back if you want to see it. The fax is broken.’

  The fax had been broken as long as I’d known her.

  ‘It might be tricky right now.’ I’d lost interest. I’d lost my fight. ‘I’m a bit tied up.’

  ‘It’s up to you, dear. I think you’ll be interested but – your choice. I’ll be here until seven.’

  I hesitated on the corner of Jen’s square, and then a black cab trundled past. I took it as a sign, though this time I didn’t bother with the Pernod.

  ‘Sorry, dear,’ she said unapologetically as I walked through the door. ‘You slipped my mind, if I’m honest.’

  ‘Nice suntan.’ I admired her deep mahogany colour, against which her orange lipstick was more alarming than ever. The smell of cats was even stronger today in the fetid basement.

  ‘Yes, well, I popped over to see my dear friend the Sphinx. One never knows when it might be the last time, you know.’

  ‘Don’t say that, Peggy.’

  ‘Well, it’s true. Time waits for no woman, as they say, my dear.’ She rummaged through several wire trays, muttering to herself co
nstantly. ‘I know it’s here somewhere.’

  I turned over a copy of today’s Telegraph, a flurry of cat hairs wafting into the air as I did so. The front page bore a big picture of Lord Higham shaking hands with Boris Johnson outside City Hall.

  ‘UK Nationalists stride towards Westminster,’ the headline crowed. I shuddered.

  ‘One giant leap for racism?’ the Guardian asked. Thank God for Xav.

  ‘Aha.’ Triumphantly Peggy handed me a cardboard file. The first piece was on Kattan and his polo team in the late eighties, a very young Ash proudly wearing polo gear. I saw the insignia, the monogram, and I remembered the sign from the horses Dalziel and I had ridden at midnight such a long time ago. They had co-owned a polo team, Kattan and Higham, but I’d learned that much already. I felt a crash of disappointment.

  ‘Is this it?’ I said. ‘You’re so kind, but – I’m not sure – I think I’ve seen it.’ It was one of the pieces I’d found last time I was here.

  Impatiently Peggy pulled something from behind it, pushing her raffish glasses on top of her head to peer at it.

  ‘You did say Huriyyah, didn’t you?’ She jabbed a gnarly finger at a tiny face. ‘I wasn’t going to forget that name in a hurry.’

  On a rather crumpled piece of yellowing A4, there was a tiny photo of a glamorous young couple, an article from the society pages of Harpers & Queen, marked 1990, the bright colours faded, the edge slightly torn.

  ‘It means Angel you know, in Arabic, Huriyyah,’ Peggy said conversationally.

  Huriyyah, wearing a midnight-blue evening dress, mouth wide and broad in a great smile of happiness. And with his arm around her proudly, head slightly tipped towards his lover, the look on his face unmistakable, straight-backed and debonair for one so young, Ash Kattan. Behind them a group of people, laughing, drinking cocktails.

  And then a tiny article clipped from one of the broadsheets, dated December 1994.

  Omar Rihad and his family have left the official residence in Kensington and returned home after the tragic and sudden death of eldest daughter Huriyyah, 24. Mr Rihad has worked as a diplomat in London for the past 7 years for the Emirate government. British envoy Lucas Johns extended his deepest sympathies, and in an unusual move, Lord Higham attended the funeral on behalf of the Prime Minister. It is his last official engagement before he also leaves British shores. Mr Rihad’s successor has yet to be announced.

  Nothing was mentioned about the way she’d died. I felt an intense wave of nausea.

  Huriyyah Rihad, dead at twenty-four, Christmas 1994, two years after the implosion of Society X. I would have been in India by then, sweating in Goa, planning my trip up to Rajasthan, newly graduated. I was busy finding myself, setting out on my new adventure … and she was lying cold in a morgue.

  Peggy jabbed at the page again with her cerise fingernail. ‘They tried to cover it up, but it was suicide or drug overdose, I’m fairly sure of it. I remember it now from the Express news-desk.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘No one really covered it, though. If you look at this,’ she handed me a photocopy of that week’s headlines, ‘Lord Higham announced the changes to Poll Tax that week, I think. Then he resigned.’

  I shivered in distress.

  Huriyyah ‘Angel’ Rihad. The girl in Dalziel’s house. The girl on the divan. I looked back at the smiling couple, obviously besotted. I looked at the group of people in the background. I thought one might be Higham.

  She had been Ash Kattan’s girlfriend all the time.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  I was climbing into the bath when Jen came home. ‘I got ravioli and Häagen-Dazs,’ she called. ‘There’s a letter here for you, by the way.’

  She handed me an expensive cream envelope with my name handwritten in thick black ink. I opened it with wet hands, trying not to smudge it. The note inside read:

  Like David, line 1, Psalm 32.

  I hope this is enough, Rose. You deserve more.

  From a friend

  When I turned over the postcard, it was a picture from the British Museum of William Blake’s Albion Rose, the pale figure slightly plump and girlish before the flaming sun.

  I climbed out of the bath and sat, dripping wet, wrapped in a towel in front of Jen’s battered old PC. I looked up Psalm 32. The first line read: ‘Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.’

  The handwriting of the postcard was unfamiliar. I turned it over in my hands, searching for another clue, and then I made a call.

  * * *

  ‘You back then? Doing a Russell Crowe?’

  Pat and I hadn’t spoken in over a year, but he sounded unsurprised to hear from me.

  ‘A what?’

  ‘You know. A maverick truth-seeking journalist on a quest.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ I grinned. ‘I’m slightly more svelte than him, I hope. No, I’m just trying to help my husband.’

  ‘Yeah, sorry about that.’ He sounded uncomfortable.

  ‘You still in Miliband’s office?’ I changed the subject.

  ‘By the skin of my teeth,’ he laughed ruefully. ‘So what can I do for you?’

  He gave me the address I needed, a road near the Oval Cricket Ground. ‘Just don’t let on it was me,’ he murmured. ‘All right, sweet pea?’

  ‘Would I?’ I murmured back. ‘Same bank account, is it?’

  ‘Don’t bother. Save it for something bigger. I might need it one of these days, the way this lot are going.’

  ‘You are a star, lovely Pat. Thank you.’

  ‘Cocktails on you, though, all right, Langton?’

  ‘Soon, Pat, I swear. Soon as I move back.’

  I waited outside the great house in the Oval for what seemed like eternity. I used to love this side of my job – the inexorable journey to the centre of the story – but now it just felt depressing, sitting here in the car with a cup of cold coffee. A Filipina maid left and returned with a shopping trolley that she could barely get up the front stairs, just as a group of hooded black boys swaggered down the road. The handsome leader caught my eye, his eyes narrowed, his diamond studs flashing beneath the streetlight. I debated getting out to save her. Then he turned to the small puffing woman and carried the trolley up to the top stair for her in one hand.

  There was hope here, somewhere, I felt it. These shores were wide enough for all of us, weren’t they?

  A black Mercedes pulled up outside the big house on the end of the row. I got out of my own car now and moved into the shadows.

  A slim woman, all long hennaed hair and high heels, got out – and then a man.

  ‘Ash,’ I stepped forward. ‘Do you remember me? I wonder if we could have a quick chat.’

  ‘I’m busy, Mrs Miller. I’ve got to get back to the Commons in an hour.’ His handsome face was set grimly – he didn’t look pleased to see me at all. Gently he pushed the woman towards the house. ‘I’ll see you inside, Laila.’

  Out on the pavement in the humid street, we eyed each other carefully. I took a deep breath.

  ‘Please, Ash. I need to know what’s going on.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ he said diffidently. ‘Where?’

  ‘I know about Huriyyah,’ I said quietly.

  A siren wailed in the distance. Ash stared at me.

  ‘What do you know?’ he snapped after a long minute. ‘Another scoop?’

  ‘That you and she—’

  ‘That your stupid society ruined her?’ He took an infinitesimal step towards me. ‘That she was drugged and raped and that she never was the same again? That she became a junkie afterwards, that she never regained her honour.’

  ‘It wasn’t my society,’ I said, but I felt my skin burning with shame. ‘And I only ever saw her once. She looked like—I didn’t think it was rape.’

  ‘Oh, didn’t you?’ he spat. ‘And what does rape look like exactly, Mrs Miller?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I mumbled. ‘But at the time, she looked like she was … ‘ I couldn’t sa
y enjoying it exactly, ‘ … complicit.’

  Had she though? At the time, maybe, but I remembered my doubts afterwards. My hesitant enquiries into her welfare, enquiries that had come to nothing.

  ‘A little heroin can help a lot, can’t it, Mrs Miller?’ He glared at me.

  ‘I wouldn’t know.’

  ‘And then a little becomes a lot.’

  ‘But what has any of that got to do with James, Ash? He didn’t give her heroin, I swear. He didn’t have sex with her. I know that for a fact.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’ He slammed the car door so violently that I flinched. ‘It’s nothing to do with me, your husband’s mess.’

  ‘It must be linked. The coincidence is too great.’

  ‘All I know, Mrs Miller, is –’ and I felt him set his teeth – ‘all I know is I need to be back in the Commons for a vote at ten – and you need to go. I don’t know anything about your husband, and Huriyyah, well, she died a long time ago.’

  ‘You must have been very sad. I hadn’t realised she was your girlfriend.’

  He glowered at me. He was imbued with utter rage, I could sense it, palpable in the air between us. But I stood my ground. ‘Is your father here?’

  ‘My father?’

  ‘Yes.’ I narrowed my eyes. ‘Mr Hadi Kattan.’

  ‘No. He’s in Iran. And I wouldn’t believe anything you hear about my father, you know. He’s a chameleon. A shape-shifter.’

  ‘Really? You sound angry with him.’

  ‘Mrs Miller, I really am not going to discuss the complexities of my family with you.’ He was disdainful, rattling the keys in his hand impatiently. ‘So if that’s all—’

  ‘It’s been adjourned, you know. My husband’s trial,’ I said.

  ‘Really?’ His surprise was unconvincing. ‘Why would that be?’

  ‘I’m not sure yet. You wouldn’t know anything about it, I suppose?’

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ he spat. I took a deep breath. I had to press on.

  ‘So, you buried Huriyyah? Poor girl.’ I was emboldened by his rudeness.