The White City by Roma Tearne

Author:Roma Tearne [Roma Tearne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781910709375
Publisher: Gallic Books
Published: 2017-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

19.

I stared at Lyle. He was crying. I don’t think I had ever seen a grown man cry until now. Aslam?

‘What’s happened?’

Lyle shook his head.

‘For God’s sake, Lyle!’ I screamed.

The door was still open. The snow had started up again, a few flakes floating lazily in the still air. Lyle reached into his bag.

The bundle took my breath away. It was torn and bloodstained and stank and I shrank away from it. We were both crying now. Aslam’s clothes, the beautiful green shirt with tropical birds on it, torn to shreds. His trainers with the knots still done up, his socks, his jeans with dried blood all over the crotch. Oh my God. Held together by string. What had they done to my brother? Lyle shook his head, embracing me as no man from our culture did. I started to sob.

‘He’s dead,’ I said.

It wasn’t a question.

‘No.’ Lyle shook his head.

‘What then?’

The clothes had fallen onto the floor and Lyle bent to pick them up.

‘Tell me!’ I screamed.

Slowly he straightened up. When he spoke, his voice was indistinct and choked and I leaned forward. But I still could not understand. In the last few moments the snow had quickened. Flakes like clumps of fur were being torn from the sky as Lyle told me what had happened to my brother.

They had taken Aslam away in the night, but which night he did not know. They would not tell either the lawyer or Lyle where he was. When they’d handed over his clothes and asked him to sign for them, Lyle had broken down, thinking, as I had, that Aslam had died in custody. But they had assured him that this was not so. Aslam was wearing prison clothes.

‘But which prison is he in?’ the lawyer had shouted. ‘You have to tell me. I am representing him. You have to tell me. It is the law!’

The police officer had stared impassively, very calm, very cold.

‘A letter will be sent to you shortly. Until we have clearance from the Home Office we cannot divulge his whereabouts.’

Lyle had demanded to speak to the person in charge but that man was the person in charge. Eventually, realising they were getting nowhere, the lawyer had persuaded Lyle to leave the security headquarters. The lawyer went off to make more phone calls and Lyle wandered around for a bit, aimlessly clutching Aslam’s belongings. He did not want to come to see us with just the clothes. He went into a café and ordered some tea. At last the lawyer rang him.

‘Go home,’ he said. ‘I’ve contacted the MP and Amnesty. I’ve talked to the Mayor and the Home Office, too. And I’ve found out what’s happened.’

It was how Lyle got the information he wanted. It hadn’t been easy but a loophole, Article F36/a17, invoked an old law that gave a lawyer the right to know where his client was being held. That loophole, Lyle told me, would soon be closed. The lawyer had been passed from

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