Dead Man Telling Tales by David Brierley

Author:David Brierley [Brierley, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Safe House Books
Published: 2022-12-12T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

Two police were smoking in the wooden sentry box outside the embassy. No sign of Martin. Clough let his gaze wander down a line of empty parked cars, a closed restaurant, a couple of shops and finally a café. A face was angled towards him in the window. Crossing the street he checked for traffic left and right. No one was following him.

Martin got up as Clough entered, nodding his head towards the back of the room. He carried his drink with him, a glass in a metal holder with a Lipton’s Yellow teabag sunk in the depths and a slice of lemon floating on top. A table in the corner caught his eye.

The waitress stood beside them and Clough ordered coffee.

‘You saw the lawyer this morning?’ Martin said.

Clough nodded.

‘What joy?’

‘He handed over the addresses of three houses – two of them I already knew. The third is on the coast, not far out of Riga.’

‘That was all?’

‘The keys.’

‘Anything else?’

‘No.’

There was a pause while Martin considered Clough’s single word as an answer. He wasn’t sceptical, certainly not accusing. Instead he kept silent. He seemed fascinated by a lemon pip floating on the surface of his tea and he concentrated on lifting it out, then raising his eyes to Clough’s face. He noted the pucker of skin to each side of his mouth, the knots of his jaw muscles. Best part of a week the lawyer had kept Matt waiting and wouldn’t even tell him it was for three house keys. Anything else? No. Some look away after they lie. Some try to outstare the questioner.

A man banged the door open from the street, shouted some cheery greeting to the waitress and left. Clough and Martin both looked away to see what the noise was about. It was enough, this sudden eruption, to break the spell. It’s mine – Clough took a breath – the journal is for me. Martin still said nothing. The silence meant that Martin suspected he was lying. The silence went on just too long so that Clough began to wonder. Why doesn’t Martin accuse me directly? Could be hiding something himself. That would make him feel a little delicate.

‘When I saw the lawyer he said someone from the British embassy had called earlier. The man didn’t speak Latvian so he’d brought a local to interpret. The man was after whatever my father had left. It did just cross my mind…’

Clough didn’t finish the sentence but he looked up and held Martin’s eyes. He could see the surprise in Martin’s face.

‘Someone from… Oh, me. I assure you…’ Martin shook his head. ‘I believe the lawyer contacted the Foreign Office in London directly so nobody at the embassy knows anything about him. Who on earth…’ He shook his head again, baffled. ‘Tell me exactly what happened when you met the lawyer.’

‘I had to sign my name.’

‘A receipt?’

‘Acknowledging I had been given blah-blah-blah. First I signed the receipt, then Debbie signed as translator. Oh, first he made me sign another piece of paper.

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