Ayesha shook her head. ‘I don’t think that’s possible. My father was just an ordinary man. He had no connection with that sort of thing. He was a taxi driver, Masood, not a Mafioso.’
‘I understand, Miss Rahman. But it is my job to ask questions. As one of your great European detectives said, “I suspect everyone and I suspect no one.” I would be indebted to you for whatever information you can furnish about Mr Ibrahim’s business activities. In my experience, this is an area which often provides fertile soil.’
‘Business activities? He didn’t have any,’ Ayesha said. ‘He was in Pakistan to look after his mother. She’s in her eighties and very frail. He was a good man doing a good deed . . . and now he’s been murdered . . .’
On the other end of the phone line, Masood Jilani did not sense the emotion that had gripped Ayesha. ‘Be that as it may. But I need to know everything about your father or we will simply remain in darkness. I must know about his financial affairs, business associates, land, property. Did he have enemies? Were there feuds? And I need to know about his personal life, his emotional involvements. I cannot tell you how many times I have encountered men who have a second family hidden away, with a wife and children in Britain and another family in their home village. I cannot exclude such a scenario in your father’s case. And that can be a powerful motive for murder.’
‘That’s completely impossible. I don’t believe any of that can be true about my dad. He was so gentle and open, and so transparent – he had no secrets from anyone.’
Masood Jilani coughed. ‘But that, I’m afraid, is the nature of secrets; they are things that no one knows about or even suspects. If they did, then they would not be secrets . . .’
‘No, Masood. Not in this case. Everyone loved my father. He had no enemies.’
Ayesha spoke with complete conviction, with total faith in the man who had cared for her and protected her all her life. She was insistent on Ibrahim the innocent victim and I wanted her to be right. Her claim that her father had no business interests in Pakistan left me uneasy – I remembered that Guddu had spoken of Ibrahim ‘carrying out his business’ while staying at his mother’s house – but I said nothing. Ayesha felt vindicated by Masood’s discoveries; she had been right not to accept that her father’s death was a suicide, and now she wanted retribution.
‘Why don’t you go and confront the police, Masood? We know for a fact that my father was murdered, and they are doing nothing about it. Why don’t you talk to Inspector Iqbal?’
Masood counselled caution. ‘The police are powerful, sometimes treacherous. Your great-uncle Guddu was right when he told you not to reveal to them what you discovered about the body in the morgue. I know how the police work and they can be as dangerous as the criminals. We need to stalk this tiger.’
‘Well, the key thing is to find the killers,’ Ayesha said, ‘and to make them pay for what they did to my dad. I’ll take your advice. Get on with your investigation and tell me what you find. Then we’ll decide what we do about the police. The person I have with me here is an investigative journalist. Martin’s going to help us with our search, and the book he’s going to write will expose the things that go on in Pakistan. You should copy him in on everything you send to me.’
When Ayesha put down the phone, I thanked her for including me in the correspondence with Masood; it felt like a sign of trust. She nodded. ‘You see why I want you to write about this. I want you to know exactly what went on, so you can shame those who did it.’
The sun rose in the bay window overlooking the canal. Things seemed to have eased between us, the memory of my last, frosty visit to her apartment apparently forgotten. But other tensions remained. Ayesha wanted me expose the men who had killed her father, and that raised the prospect of personal danger for me as well as her. And we differed over who would have control over the book, who would lead and who would follow.
I got up to leave, but Ayesha offered to show me her flat. On a bookshelf there were photos of a young man in chinos and a blue shirt. I asked who it was.
‘That’s Peter. We’re pretty much engaged.’
‘Pretty much? What does that mean?’
‘It means I’m not sure. What about you? You’re married?’
‘Yes. Twenty years.’
‘I see. A good experience?’
‘Are you asking my advice?’
‘Maybe.’
‘How long have you and Peter been together?’
‘Nearly six years, but we’ve had to keep it secret. Peter’s white; my family wouldn’t have approved.’
‘Okay. But you haven’t married Peter in all that time, so what makes you think you’ll do it now?’
Ayesha frowned. ‘I don’t know if I will . . . Perhaps . . . My father would have been heartbroken if I’d married Peter; that’s partly why I didn’t. But he’s gone now and somehow I feel free. It’s terrible to think that I’m free because my daddy’s dead. He left me bereaved and liberated; a punishment and a gift all at the same time . . . I can’t get my head around it.’
‘I don’t think you have to, Ayesha. You don’t need to feel bad. You loved your father; and you love Peter, don’t you?’
‘Maybe. When marriage was impossible, I never had to ask myself if I loved him enough to marry him . . .’
The conversation had taken an awkward turn. I was opening the door to leave when Ayesha threw her arms round me. ‘Thank you so much,’ she said. ‘I’m so glad I came to you.’
CHAPTER 5
Embarking on a new book offers the fascination of a beginning with many endings. But for a book that springs from real events the devil, perversely, is in the uncertainty. Might those involved back out with the thing half-written? Might they disagree over how the story should be told? For the author it is an unsecured emotional investment in a venture that can founder on many rocks. The tone would be a challenge. Ayesha’s story was full of drama; the book would have to tread a path between underselling and overplaying it. And the form was a dilemma. Would it be a factual documentary? A dramatised version with imagined scenes and dialogue? Or should the whole thing be fictionalised? Would ‘Martin’ appear as a character, and if so would it be me or a fictitious avatar? Names, places and some events would in any case have to be changed to shield those at risk. The story revolved around a murder, the perpetrators of which were still at liberty. Naming them would expose the victim’s family – and potentially the writer – to reprisals.
Christmas came. On Boxing Day I found an email from Masood Jilani, addressed to Ayesha and copied to me as she had instructed:
Dear Miss Rahman
I beg to report that I have been following leads as per your commission and I fear I have discovered something unsavoury. Were you aware that your father has been a regular visitor to Pakistan for the past eleven years? May I inquire if you were aware of the purpose of these visits?
Yours respectfully,
Senior Inspector (retired) Masood Jilani.
The tone of the message was ominous. I emailed Ayesha. She did not reply directly, but copied me on her response to Masood:
Dear Masood,
No, my father did not tell me about his visits to Pakistan. I have been living away from the family home during the period you refer to. I believed he was visiting Pakistan to care for his mother, my grandmother. If you have any indication to the contrary, please let me know.
Masood’s reply came almost at once:
Dear Miss Rahman,
I do not wish to leap to conclusions. But I have discovered that your uncle Ahmed has also been coming here – regularly, like your father. I have investigated the identity of the fellows you encountered in Mr Ahmed’s company and I regret to inform you that these men are gangsters. Furthermore I have discovered that your late father was engaged in substantial business activities in Kahin Nahi, viz: he was buying up land, many acres of it, and building a mansion on it. I am reliably informed that the bathrooms of this mansion have golden taps. Do you by a
ny chance know where Mr Ibrahim was getting the money from?
A week went by and no further messages arrived in my inbox. Ayesha had stopped copying me on her correspondence with Masood. I emailed her, but she didn’t reply. Had Masood uncovered ‘something unsavoury’ about her father that she didn’t want me to know about?
My fears of Ayesha pulling away seemed to be coming true. But at the same time the suggestion that Ibrahim might have been less than an innocent victim piqued my imagination. Ayesha herself was becoming darker and more complex.
In mid-January she rang to suggest we meet for a drink. She had been thinking about things and wanted ‘to discuss our relationship going forward’. Rather than invite me to her flat, she suggested the bar on Piccadilly where we had first spoken. The conversation began awkwardly.
‘Look,’ she said, ‘I know you’re not stupid. I should never have asked Masood to copy his emails to you, but it’s too late to undo that now. You’re wondering what Masood has come up with. Okay, I’ll tell you. You’d probably find out anyway if you wanted to. He thinks my dad got caught up in some crooked business in Pakistan and that’s the reason he got murdered. Masood says he’s got solid information. I don’t believe it. So that’s where we’re up to.’
She seemed to be closing down the conversation, but I felt she wanted to talk. I asked if there was anything she would like to share with me. She sat for a moment.
‘Okay. Masood rang me. He’s very polite and very . . . Pakistani, if you know what I mean. He dresses everything up in circumlocutions, but basically he’s traced one of the men I saw talking to Ahmed at my father’s funeral. The guy’s name is Javed Shafik and it turns out he’s a big shot in Pakistani organised crime. Masood says he’s a drug-dealer, a kidnapper, a blackmailer, a people-trafficker – you name it. But the police can’t touch him because he’s got protection from the local politicians, or even national politicians for all I know. Masood says that’s the way things are done over there: the mafia guys do the political parties’ dirty work – beating up the opposition, bumping them off – and the politicians give them big hand-outs from state funds. Masood says there’s a scam that’s going on in Kahin Nahi involving extortion rackets and kidnappings. He doesn’t know much more, but he’s going to keep digging.’
‘That sounds dramatic.’ My thoughts were with Ayesha, but I probably had half an eye on the book. ‘So does Masood think your dad was killed by these crooks?’
‘No, that’s just it. Masood thinks my dad and Ahmed were involved in the scam . . . that they were crooks themselves.’
CHAPTER 6
A week went by with no word from Ayesha. I rang and emailed but she didn’t respond. I took the tube to Maida Vale and knocked on her door. She seemed unsurprised to see me.
‘I was wondering how long it would be before you came to doorstep me. Once a journalist . . . So what do you want?’
I asked if she had heard any more from Masood Jilani and she said she hadn’t. But she had been thinking about what he’d told her.
‘Look, Martin, I’m as keen as you are to find out the truth, only for different reasons. I need to understand what my father was doing in Pakistan – it turns out he’s been going there for ten years or more. Masood’s got it in his head that Dad and Ahmed were part of some international criminal ring, but the whole thing seems ridiculous to me. I’m going to talk to my mother and see what she knows about Dad’s trips. I’ll go up to Burnley next week. You can come with me if you want. You know so much about the story, you may as well find out the rest.’
Ayesha had a sports car and she enjoyed using it. I had barely slid into the passenger seat before she put her foot down. The length of the Kilburn Road we sat in silence. Approaching the North Circular she clicked the CD player; it was the Lamento from Bach’s B-flat capriccio. I recognised the pianist as Leon Fleisher and Ayesha smiled. ‘So you like proper music then? That’s nice. Peter’s a Ska fan.’
Long drives in a small car are an imposed intimacy. The car was fast but the journey was slow, the M1 nose to tail with traffic.
‘I bet the motorways weren’t like this when Ahmed drove my dad up from Gatwick in 1969,’ Ayesha said. It felt like a cue. I asked her if she would tell me the rest of her father’s story; last time, she had stopped at her own birth in 1975.
‘Yes, right; that’s when I came on the scene. Dad was over here but Asma hadn’t got her visa yet. She and I had four years in Pakistan together. It’s astonishing how much I can remember about it. Everything was so different; I think it must have burned itself into my brain. I can remember the sunshine, the heat, the smells of the cooking as if it’s happening now, not thirty years ago . . .’
‘. . . or nearly forty years ago . . .’
‘Okay, there’s no need for that,’ Ayesha said, smiling. ‘It seems Dad came over to see us from time to time; he must have come at least once, because my mother Asma got pregnant with Bilal. He was born in Kahin Nahi like me. I can’t remember much about that. What I do remember is my grandfather, Hassan, and how strict he was. I was terrified of him; the least little thing and he’d be yelling at Mum and me. It must have been all those years he spent in the military. My great-uncle Guddu was the one who looked after me. He was so lovely, just like his sister, Hassan’s wife. I remember he used to take me outside and let me play in the dirt with the worms and insects. I think the bugs must have been much bigger in Pakistan and much more colourful; I can see them crawling up and down the stalks of grass in our garden. Guddu used to sit smoking his cigarettes and reading Dawn, the Pakistani newspaper, and he just left me to it. I always felt safe, because I knew he was looking after me.’
‘It sounds idyllic. What was it like when you realised you were leaving to go to England?’
‘It was a shock. The flight from Karachi to Heathrow was very early in the morning and everyone was in tears. Guddu was beside himself; he thought he would never see us again. I think I must have slept on the flight, because the next thing I remember is being at Heathrow and Dad and Ahmed were there to meet us. I had hardly seen Dad before then, and apparently I didn’t want him to pick me up or kiss me.’
‘And what were your first impressions of Burnley?’
‘The cold! And the gloominess of everything. That’s what I remember. I’d been used to sunshine and wide open spaces. So coming to Burnley you were suddenly in this dark place with brick buildings everywhere and rain and fog the whole time, or at least that’s what it felt like. I got used to Ibrahim being my dad, though. I think he felt a bit guilty that he’d left us on our own over there, so he made a big effort to be nice to us. And despite what he told his mates about wanting a son, it was me who was his favourite. He was always buying me things – Barbie dolls and a plastic kitchen range to play on, with plastic knives and forks and pans and everything. He must have loved me because he spent a fortune!’
‘Was he still living with Ahmed and the others at Uncle Kabir’s house?’
‘No, he’d moved. He’d got a little semi in quite a nice neighbourhood. He was still working at the mill, so he must have done lots of overtime and saved everything he could. The thing about Ibrahim is that he always aspired to be English. He wanted an English way of life, for him and for us. And he wanted us to be middle class.’
‘He wanted you to be English?’
‘Yes. So, for instance, Ahmed and the other men who’d been living at Uncle Kabir’s all went on to buy houses in Pakistani neighbourhoods. They wanted to stick together. But Dad didn’t. He was adamant that we were going to live in a white neighbourhood where there were no immigrants. And the people there liked him. He spoke the funniest English you’ve ever heard. Everyone was “chuck” and “luv” and so on, but with the strongest Pakistani accent. Mum’s English is even worse. They were both insistent that we children should learn English properly, so we wouldn’t have an accent.’
‘Well, I’d say it worked. You sound like you went to the poshest of public schools.’
‘I didn’t, though! We went to the local state school then the comprehensive. But we had home tutors, including one who came to give us elocution lessons. Ibrahim was obsessed with us speaking well. He said it was the only way to get on.’
‘What about religion? Did you have Muslim schooling as well?’
‘Every night. We’d have a quick snack when we got home from school, then we’d go to the mosque for an hour of Islamic teaching. I say Dad wanted us to be British, but there was a sort of duality about it. We’d have an English tutor on Saturday then an Urdu tutor on Sunday. Mum and Dad spoke Sindhi at home, but they also made us learn Urdu, because it was all about moving up and getting on. Urdu is the official language of Pakistan, so if you speak it people can tell you are educated. Dad was an intelligent man, but he wasn’t educated. He always used to say that if he’d had an education he would have made something of his life.’
‘What do you mean about duality? Between being British and being Pakistani?’
‘Yes. Mum and Dad wanted us to be British but they also considered themselves and us to be Pakistani. Very much so. And there seemed to be no sense of any conflict about it. Perhaps they were naïve, but they thought they could have both – being British with all that implies in terms of opportunity and better standards of living, but retaining their Pakistani identity. Back then when I was growing up, it seemed possible. I’d say that was the happiest time of our lives in England.’
‘It sounds happy. But those were the years of Enoch Powell and the National Front, weren’t they? Did that sort of thing never affect you?’
‘It did, but not for a while. At first everything was fine. Asma loved the life here, and she loved Ibrahim for giving it to her. Neither of them seemed to understand that there would be challenges – like racial prejudice and their kids struggling to fit in. That would all come later.’
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