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48
48
How long I hung there before Sandra screamed God only knows.
But it had the right effect, as I held on with desperation, the performance immediately stopped, the lights went on, and the audience looked away from the stage and up towards me.
My assailant had gone, but that didn't make the situation any easier. I hung on for dear life as theatre staff members came to my assistance, two male programme sellers pulling me to safety.
I didn't stop to thank them, but I did ask them which way the assailant went.
I gave chase, heading for the exit, taking the curving downward staircase to the door that led to the street. Out into the night, the crowds made finding my attacker almost impossible, but when I saw in the distance a man running in the direction of Charing Cross, I gave chase.
He was twenty yards ahead of me, but I kept running, getting closer with every stride. Despite my age, I was reasonably fit, and I kept going.
He dis
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IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 49
49 I ran. I was racing a train, trying to catch up with it. Hearing the slow-motion noise, grinding mechanical feedback underpinned by the terror growing within. One dirty red carriage after another rolls in, doors all set to open and inhale platform. Life is anything but stationary once the underground is entered. The crowded platform was a microcosm of every waiting room in the world, taking away the walls, the track, the metal benches, and it could be any waiting room for anything anywhere, anyplace. Passengers on the train looked at me as I weaved through the packed platform. Trying to reach the same carriage, my target was waiting to board. The train stopped. Give me a chance. The doors opened. The target waited by the doors of the first carriage. I ran down the platform, my feet hitting the concrete hard, sending shockwaves right up to my brain. My lungs heaved like the air was acidic, and every part of me felt like it would break if I didn't st
IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 50
50 After tidying up, I went methodically around the flat, drawing curtains, checking windows, and locking and bolting all the doors. I even managed to fix the front door. "What are you doing?" Sandra asked, looking tired in the kitchen. "Pulling up the drawbridge." "Oh." Despite the hassle of tidying up the horrific mess, she seemed a great deal more focused and in command of herself, and when I had finished securing the entire flat, she said, "The police will want a list of what's gone. I will help you make it." "Thanks." We started on the dining room add made reasonable progress, with me putting the empty drawers back in the sideboard while trying to remember what each had once contained and Sandra writing down my dictation. I had been given a significant amount of cutlery and china over the years. A warmth for anything that belonged to my parents. My pleasure in owning it seemed to have vanished with the goods. Instead of be
IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 51
51 After DI Brooks left, I closed all the drapery, turned on the lights, and sat in a comfy chair to read. "Aren't we going to alter the venue for this evening's events?" Sandra asked. "This is now a crime scene." "If we change it, our suspect will get suspicious." "Very well," Sandra shrugged, and this was followed by a rigorous knocking on the door. "That will be Hector and his mate," I said, standing up to respond to the thumping. But when I opened it, I discovered I was looking at a worn-down old lady. "Good afternoon," she said, in a rumbling and oddly recognisable voice. "Come on in, Stewart. Meet Quintus Noone and DI Burton." We observed an old man waddle into the flat, lugging an overnight case over which he was bowed in understandable distress. The old lady shut the door and removed her coat and then her wig, disclosing the recognisable face of Hector Nelson. "Hello, DCI Burton," he said. "It's a joy to see you
IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 52
52 When we had all finished eating, Sandra brought a tray of coffee. I invited the two policemen to relax on the settee, and we all paid the detective chief inspector kindly accolades as she cleared the table. "I almost forgot to tell you, Mr. Noone," Nelson said, "and it may not even matter. But a couple of interesting details came to my attention, and I would be remiss if I failed to share them." “Please do.” "We have continuously supposed that there are two unexplained couples involved in this case," said Nelson, "but that might not be true, sir." "Why’s that?" "One couple," Nelson said, "the so-called Mediterranean couple, were purportedly buzzed into Tina's residence by a neighbour, apparently after asserting to have a key to Tina’s flat. Detectives are clearly fascinated by the Mediterranean couple, and police artists have even created e-fits of them. The other couple met Tina Davis several times at the
IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 53
"Very well," said the Home Secretary. I sat in an armchair and scrutinised intently at our visitor opposite. "I can begin with the particulars of the tableau. Even though no exact reason of death has been proven, our study has left no misgiving in my mind that Tina Davis was assassinated." "Really!" exclaimed the Home Secretary. "Oh, no! She was the victim of a very strange kinky sex game gone wrong, wasn't she?" "That is not true. The state of the flat and that of her corpse propose an alternative justification completely." "I did not know," said the Home Secretary. "No, I you didn't. There is a great deal of misperception about what happened." "A resentful paramour?" the Home Secretary suggested. "No, definitely not. Offences of lust are generally chaotic; the wrongdoer gets flustered and consigns a profusion of proof. In this case, the lack of scientific verification, among other things, advocates planning." "Fuck me
IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 54
Under arrest?" the Home Secretary cried. "Are you stupid? I am a Home Secretary! A representative of the Cabinet! I am a fragment of the Government!! Do you comprehend??""Yes!" Nelson said."I cannot be under arrest!" the Home Secretary continued. "I cannot be incarcerated! I cannot be put on trial! Don't you know anything?""I do understand," said Nelson calmly, "that no man's job designation seats him above the rules.""Ha!" the Home Secretary replied, whose pallid face was becoming more sanguine with each occurring second. "We become the law! We are the law! The directive is ours! It is not to be expended in opposition to us!"Sandra, Nelson, and I gaped in incredulity as the manacled man carried on. Alderman, progressing gradually, appeared from the bedroom and began to move toward us. The Home Secretary didn't seem to perceive; he just stormed on."We're the administration!" he bellowed. "We make the regulations. So clearly we cannot r
IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 55
I woke up early the following day to find that Sandra had already left, although she hadn't eaten breakfast. Instead, I found a note and a newspaper. I read the note first. Quintus There is terrible news this morning. I have gone to find out what the Commissioner knows about this. All the morning papers say the same. So here is the story in its most diminutive illegible form. I will return as soon as possible. SB Then I picked up the paper and found that Sandra had circled a headline, which read: Two Metropolitan Police Shot In Jewellery Shop Robbery Home Secretary Unharmed, Cabinet Shuffled The text was this: Two Metropolitan Police officers sustained gunshot wounds yesterday after apparently stumbling upon an attempted burglary in progress. Detectives Hector Nelson, 45, and Stewart Alderman, 32, were wounded while chasing suspe
IF THE TRUTH BE TOLD 56
"But why?" Sandra demanded, "I cannot believe you are willing to give up, so easily.""When I said, I was going to drop it, what I meant was that the Home Secretary angle has been shut off to me, but there are more than one way to skin a cat.""Please, Quintus, tell me, what you are planning to do?""Very well. Unless I'm reading it entirely incorrect, the crime concerned as much personality elimination as bodily slaying. What could be the reason? It seems to me that Tina must have been doing something her managers found unbearable, something that made her a burden rather than an advantage, and I don't think she was very careful about it.""Go on," Sandra pressed."She was besieged for a three-branched attack: first, to quieten her forever; second, to make sure she would never be contemplated well-thought-of, though she may have been much more than that; and third, to warn her co-workers of the significances of pursuing the trail she chose."
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