Death by Design

Author:Barbara Nadel [Nadel, Barbara]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Headline
Published: 2011-05-12T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

* * *

Çetin İkmen had often wondered how it would feel to be a citizen of another country. He was Turkish and proud to be so, but what if his parents had moved somewhere else when he was little? What if they had gone to Germany or England? If that had happened, where would his loyalties lie now? Unwittingly, Ayşe answered the question. They were standing outside the Tower of London and İkmen was looking somewhat askance at the Beefeaters.

‘Why do they wear clothes that surely are from the time of Henry the Eighth?’ he asked. ‘And if they are supposed to be guarding the Tower, why do they only carry pikes?’

‘You’d like to see them carry guns?’ Ayşe asked.

‘No. But if they’re guarding the place, I mean given current realities . . .’

‘The Tower is very well-protected, believe me,’ Ayşe said. ‘As for the Beefeaters and their clothes, well, yes, they are Tudor, and why not? It’s tradition. In İstanbul you have the Mehter, the Ottoman military band. I don’t see them wearing modern clothes. Here we have something that reflects our past.’

‘Our past?’

‘Like it or not, Uncle Çetin, I am both British and Turkish,’ Ayşe said with a smile. ‘As a police officer in this country I have sworn allegiance to the Queen. I am proud of my Turkish heritage but that doesn’t stop me from being a true Brit, or rather a particular type of Brit.’

İkmen frowned.

‘I’m a Mancunian,’ Ayşe said. ‘You talk about wanting to go home to Turkey and your family, I can’t wait to get back to Manchester and my folk. Apart from the odd inter-gang incident, the Met didn’t have too much to do with the Turkish community until Ahmet Ülker started flexing his muscles. At first they thought they’d just shut him down. But when it became apparent that he had other business interests in other places, the decision was taken to keep him under surveillance until such time as he could be taken down properly.’ She pointed to the great yellow and grey castle and said, ‘Do you want to go in?’

‘I would like to,’ İkmen said, ‘but I don’t think there’s enough time. I need to see this Mark Lane and the area around it.’

Ayşe held her arm out to him. ‘OK. Why don’t we just walk beside the river. I can show you the main features – Traitor’s Gate, the White Tower – and you can see where the mayor of London lives too.’

‘Ah, Mr Üner. He lives by the river?’

They began walking down in front of the Tower gift shop towards the River Thames.

‘Practically,’ Ayşe said. ‘His office, City Hall, is over there, on the southern shore of the Thames.’ She pointed to a most peculiar modern building fashioned, İkmen thought, rather like a misshapen cone. ‘Haluk Üner is a workaholic. He always arrives for work early, leaves late, works on Saturdays. He is very fit but sometimes when he is under a lot of stress, you can see him outside City Hall having a cigarette.

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