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4

Within an hour of her arrival at Knightly Court the next morning, another envelope addressed to Sara Shah and marked ‘Private and Confidential’ was hand-delivered. This one contained a typed letter on Inquiry notepaper, signed by Sir Francis Morahan himself, offering an initial three-month engagement as junior counsel; a contract from the Government Legal Department would arrive within twenty-four hours, proposing a start on the upcoming Monday. All Sara now had to do was make her confession to Ludovic Temple. Fortunately, or not, he was in chambers, not court. She knocked on his door.

‘Come!’

She entered. He rose with a giant grin. ‘Sara, you don’t need to knock, you know that.’ She looked down at the letter in her hand and then her feet. He followed her eyes. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘You remember that letter, Ludo?’

His face sagged like a collapsed soufflé. ‘Hell, someone’s made you a better offer. I bloody knew it.’

She looked up, the colour restored to her cheeks. ‘It’s not as bad as that.’

She gave him a broad brush picture of Morahan’s initial letter and her unorthodox dealings with him since, though she did not speak of his secret information, nor its source.

‘Curious man, Francis Morahan,’ said Temple. ‘Something inscrutable, almost odd, about him. Never thought his resignation was what it seemed. Clever though. And affable enough. I wouldn’t have imagined him as a doer. Not in the way you’re now describing.’

‘He seems determined.’

‘Good for him. Give those rascals a kick up the posterior.’ He frowned. ‘But why you? Must be others he could get?’

‘I’ve asked myself – and him – that. He’s insistent.’

Temple sighed. ‘Well, dammit, he’s right. You’re the best. But do you have to?’

She worried about sounding pretentious. ‘I feel it’s my duty. He needs a specific job done. I said I’d give him three months, no more.’

‘Duty. Hmmm…’ He affected to examine her. She silently held his eye. ‘You mean it, don’t you?’

‘Yes, I think I do.’

He spoke with an unusual tenderness. ‘Then you must do it. But stick to your guns and don’t get bogged down. These inquiries go on for ever. Do the job he wants and then come back.’

‘That’s a deal.’ She stuck her hand out and he formally shook it, both now at ease. ‘I’m sorry to leave you in the lurch, Ludo.’

‘It’s fine. Next week’s prep and I’m not back in court till the week after. I’ll grab Sheila instead.’

‘Not literally, I hope.’

‘Ha! Funny girl.’ He screwed up his eyes. ‘Just as well you’re the joker. We’re not allowed to laugh at that sort of thing any more, are we?’

As instructed, Sara arrived the next Monday at the Inquiry offices at 9.15 a.m., having hung around to avoid being early. The tube journey, Tooting Broadway to Vauxhall via Stockwell, was a breeze after the twists and turns to the Temple. She was met at reception by the PA to the Secretary, a squat, bespectacled young man with straggly black hair who announced himself as Clovis Hobbs-Fanshawe and managed nervously to stretch out a hand to shake while forgetting the accompanying smile.

Morahan, in a surprising and warm phone call over the weekend, had told Sara he’d chosen Pamela Bailly as the Inquiry Secretary – effectively its chief executive. She was a Treasury high-flier and therefore, he explained, not from a Department he might be investigating. He also said she was extraordinarily efficient. Sara wondered if Clovis had been terrorised by her. No doubt a bulging Oxbridge brain lurked behind his jumping eyes.

As she was ushered by Clovis into the Secretary’s capacious office, Pamela Bailly sprang up and strode round her desk to offer a firm handshake. Brisk with an edge of brusqueness, tallish, trim, precise, a smart cut of auburn hair shaped to the neckline, she projected a force field of compressed energy. Sara suspected some of it was a cloak, though there was no obvious sign of brittleness on the sculpted red fingernails.

‘Welcome, Ms Shah, delighted to meet you.’

‘Do call me Sara.’

‘I will. Pamela.’ She paused. ‘Not Pam. So… you’re here to chivvy us along.’

Sara smiled, determined to forge some form of bond. ‘I can see that no chivvying is needed.’

‘In some ways not. A great deal of information, research and expertise has been gathered but we’re still some way from formal hearings. Indeed, we’ve only just started the search for counsel. Now his Lordship appears to have pre-empted it.’

‘I think it’s more because he has some specific tasks in mind.’

‘That would appear to be between you and him.’ Was there an edge in her tone? As if her own special access to her Chairman was being disarranged? She seemed a woman for whom control was important. ‘At any rate,’ continued Pamela, ‘he seems to me a reinvigorated man and that is all to the good. We will all do everything we can to help you.’

Sara chided herself for the suspicion. ‘I appreciate that.’

‘Shall we do the tour?’

She led Sara out of her office, past Clovis’s gate-keeping desk and into an open-plan space. From six desks, six heads peered noiselessly up. Four further desks were empty. ‘This is the Secretariat,’ said Pamela nodding briefly to the upturned faces without introducing them. ‘Our junior counsel, Sara Shah.’ The murmur of hellos was almost inaudible. Sara noticed that, despite the nature of the Inquiry, only one face was Asian – a woman, probably in her late twenties, wearing a knee-length skirt and long-sleeved blouse, head uncovered. ‘The spare desks are for our distinguished panel members should they ever care to look in.’

A corridor led off the open-plan area; Pamela led Sara through the first door on the right. An older woman, full bosomed with long, steel-grey hair tied in an imprecise bun, looked up.

‘Sylvia Labone, our archivist,’ said Pamela. ‘Meet Sara Shah, our new junior counsel.’

Sylvia rose with a cough – ex-smoker, Sara immediately assumed. Maybe still – there was a yellowness on her fingers. ‘Good morning, Ms Shah.’ Her voice was throaty, confirming first impressions.

‘Sara, please.’ She looked around at long shelves of files on rails. ‘You’re the keeper of the secrets.’

Sylvia scowled before degenerating into a further cough. ‘If only.’

‘We don’t have a prayer room per se,’ said Pamela, ‘but there might be an appropriate corner here in the library. I mentioned it to Sylvia.’

You really are organised, thought Sara.

‘Of course,’ said Sylvia, ‘whenever you wish. Never mind me, I’ve seen and heard it all.’

Sara followed Pamela along the corridor to an end door that revealed a large office with a broad walnut desk, leather chairs behind and in front, windows to left and right, and a long sofa running along the inside wall. To one side, the view was dominated by the four-square-mass of the American Embassy; to the other, across Nine Elms Road, stretches of the Thames were visible between designer riverside apartment blocks.

‘Sir Francis’s office,’ said Pamela. ‘It was his decision to base us here rather than Whitehall or anywhere near the Law courts. I think he felt across the river was more…’ she searched for the word, ‘appropriate for some of our potential witnesses.’ She inspected the sofa and puffed up its row of cushions. ‘He apologises. He’d wanted to be here in person for your arrival but the Home Secretary asked for a catch-up at the last minute.’

‘Geoff Atkinson,’ said Sara.

‘Yes.’ Her tone hinted at contempt. ‘You’ll find that Sir Francis has his own working pattern. He tends to stay late on Thursday evenings to catch up with the week. I believe he likes the undisturbed peace of a deserted office. I understand his wife shapes her social diary around that. As for everyone else, we’re a nine to six operation and that’s the way I prefer it. If you need to work late, we’ll give you your own key and code.’

‘I’d like that option.’

‘As you will.’

Pamela guided her back along the corridor to a side door they had passed. ‘Finally you. Legal.’ She knocked and entered an office of similar size to Morahan’s but with four desks, smaller windows and walls lined with book shelves. One desk was occupied.

‘Morning, Pamela.’

‘May I introduce Patrick Duke, Government Legal Department. In my view an inelegant change in terminology from Treasury Solicitors,’ said Pamela, again with that edge. ‘Patrick, this is Sara Shah. Sara, I’ll leave you in his hands.’ She bestowed a quick smile on them, turned on her heel and closed the door behind her.

Patrick grinned and shook Sara’s hand. ‘She’s a piece of work.’

‘I can imagine,’ said Sara.

‘Welcome.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Coffee?’

‘Tea would be lovely if you have it.’

‘I’m prepared. Builder’s, Earl Grey, peppermint, chamomile.’

‘Builder’s is good.’ His grin broadened and he strolled to a corner containing a kettle, cups and a mini-fridge. Though she was annoyed with herself for it, Sara couldn’t help her surprise. He was tall and thin. And black. Unequivocally black. She followed him to the mini-kitchen corner.

‘People tend to call me Paddy – rather a feeble joke from my days of incarceration at one of England’s great schools, which I’m afraid has stuck.’ He was well-spoken with a deep-voiced singer’s projection. ‘You know. A black paddy. Ha ha. You get a hit on two races in one. All terribly good-natured of course, old boy.’ With only a small stretch of his own accent he escalated to an exaggerated upper-class honk.

‘I think I’ll unstick it and call you Patrick if that’s all right.’

‘Suits me. Sugar and milk?’

‘Just as, please.’

He wandered over to a window. The view was dominated by one corner of the American Embassy which she had seen more fully from Morahan’s window. ‘Good to know our cousins watch over us,’ said Patrick.

‘What are those conical steel things hanging off the walls?’ asked Sara.

‘Secret anti-aircraft whizzbangs,’ said Patrick. ‘That’s why it’s such a monstrous mass of a building, not a nice slender spire. Packed full of rockets and helmeted men in black special forces suits ready to scale down the walls and occupy the streets shouting Delta and Zulu.’

Sara laughed. They sat down at neighbouring desks.

‘Well…’ he began. She tilted her head to the side, encouraging him. ‘Our Chairman says he wants you to get out and about. Talk to people. He feels he’s lacking actual, unmediated accounts from young Muslims themselves.’

‘Yes.’

‘Rather unusual? For counsel, I mean.’

‘Not really, I did on-the-ground work for Rainbow.’

‘But that’s a campaigning chambers.’

‘And we shouldn’t be here?’

‘There’s no should or shouldn’t. It’s whatever Sir Francis wants. With one condition.’

‘Oh?’

‘I accompany you.’

She looked down at her hands. ‘That might be awkward. It may be hard to win their confidence.’

‘That’s fine. You see them alone. Initially anyway. But you may need me to witness. Or for affidavits.’

‘If I get any.’

‘I’m sure you will.’ He switched off the grin. ‘And some of these characters won’t be friendly. I’ll stay out of the way but you can’t be alone.’

‘So you’re to be my chaperone?’

‘No, Sara, I’m just to be there. Even if all I am is your driver with a leather jacket, a Nigerian accent and a lucky zebra dangling from the rear-view mirror.’ She couldn’t help smiling and the grin reappeared.

Shortly before lunch, Morahan arrived and poked his head around the Legal department door. ‘Sara. Welcome. Come and chat.’ After the earlier conversation, she felt guilty about leaving Patrick; he gave her a friendly nod of the head.

Morahan guided her to one end of his brown leather office sofa while he sat down at the other. ‘Coffee? Tea?’

‘I’m fine, thanks. Patrick’s been the perfect host.’

‘Good. Decent chap.’

She hesitated. ‘I hadn’t realised he would be accompanying me on research trips.’

‘Yes, I should have told you first thing. Would have but for our friend Atkinson’s summons.’

‘Oh, how was that?’

‘He just wants it over. I suspect the appearance of enthusiasm in front of the Prime Minister was purely for show.’ He gave a clipped chuckle, then frowned with what seemed to her embarrassment. ‘Patrick persuaded me that you shouldn’t be on your own. He is after all the instructing solicitor who would normally be running evidence gathering.’

‘As long as he doesn’t get in the way.’

‘He won’t.’

She hesitated. ‘There’s an issue.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Racism is not just white and black. It grieves me to say it, but there is often strong prejudice in my community against Africans and West Indians.’

‘Yes, I know. It was one reason Patrick couldn’t do the task I need you to do. Nor is he in your league.’

‘I’m sure he—’

‘No, he’s not, Sara. You are an outstanding young lawyer with the right credentials, both as a professional and as a human being.’

Sara saw him smiling at her with an almost paternal fondness and tried not to show her pleasure.

‘I’ve no doubt you’ll get on with him,’ he continued.

‘Oh yes,’ she said enthusiastically. ‘And there won’t be any complications,’ she added, immediately wishing she hadn’t. She made to rise but he held up a hand to halt her and went to his desk. He opened the middle drawer, extracted a key and unlocked the bottom left pedestal drawer. He pulled out an unmarked white A4 envelope.

‘This contains photocopies I’ve made from Sayyid’s folder.’ He handed the envelope to her. ‘For Patrick, and anyone else, the story is that you are working initially from cases you came across at Rainbow which you hope will lead to others. It would appear that your first trip will be to the North.’

‘Wherever it leads.’

They stood up together. ‘Three people know about Sayyid. You and me. And my wife, Iona. I’ve put her in the picture and she understands the meaning of the word “secret”. She also knows about you.’ He ushered her to the door, then stopped. ‘Of course there’s a fourth person who knows too. Sayyid him- or herself. But once you start ringing doorbells, other ears and eyes may be alerted. For good or bad, we are a surveilled society.’

Sara returned to the Legal office. Patrick peered up, noticing the envelope under her arm. ‘Secrets from the Chairman?’ he asked teasingly.

Sara kicked herself for the carelessness and hoped she betrayed none of the thuds with which her heart had just rattled her ribcage. ‘Chairman’s induction,’ she replied. ‘He strikes me as a man who likes things done in a certain way.’ She put it in her case. ‘I honestly don’t think I’ve the energy right now for house rules and regs. Might make my mark with Sylvia instead.’

‘Good luck.’ Patrick pulled a child-like grimace and returned to his screen.

Deliberately leaving the case by her desk to suggest nothing unusual, she went next door to the library.

Sylvia Labone looked up fiercely. ‘You’re back.’

‘I thought I’d give you a rough idea of prayer times – though they keep changing, of course.’

‘Would you like me to vacate?’

‘Not at all, you won’t be disrupted.’

She looked Sara up and down. ‘Do you smoke?’

‘No.’

‘Of course not. Right, let me show you around.’

She walked Sara up and down the shelves, describing her colour coding for submissions, authors, reports and originally commissioned research. ‘Of course, this material is all digitally stored too but our distinguished panel members often prefer to read hard copies. When they read anything at all.’

‘It’s impressive,’ said Sara, trying to soothe a woman whom life seemed to have made congenitally angry. ‘What about police and intelligence files?’

‘Coming to that,’ replied Sylvia irritably. ‘Their research reports and general assessments are handled in the same way. However, since Snowden, anything classified, shall we say, is, frankly, fog and mist, subject to endless redactions. Most of them look like a sea of black waves.’

‘Surely we can get more,’ asked Sara brightly.

‘You’d better get to work on our chairman,’ she replied. ‘Names. Names, places, times, addresses. It’s all scrubbing brush without those, isn’t it?’

At 5 p.m., Sara tapped on Morahan’s half-open door.

‘Come in, Sara, come in,’ he beamed. His informality continued to surprise her.

‘I’ve looked at those files,’ she said. ‘There’s no guarantee of finding any of those five names or of them talking if we do.’

‘Let’s see. I trust your ingenuity.’

‘And I’ve no idea anyway what story they have to tell.’ She cast him a trenchant look. ‘Do you?’

‘No. Nor do I know whether Sayyid does or if he’s leaving us to find out. And we have only his word that they lead to significant wrongdoing relevant to this Inquiry’s remit.’ He gave an encouraging smile. ‘But at least there seems the one link, doesn’t there?’

‘Yes,’ she said quietly. ‘As you say, let’s see.’

She hesitated, wondering whether or not to raise her nagging question. He read her. ‘Is there something you want to ask?’

‘I’m not sure.’

‘Try me.’

‘It’s just – I know I’ve asked it before – why me? You’ve been so emphatic that it could be no one else.’ She took the plunge. ‘Is there anything you’re not telling me?’

He rubbed his eyes and looked straight into hers. ‘I promise you there is no one more suitable for this task. Every word I’ve exchanged with you since has confirmed that view.’

‘And that’s it?’

‘Yes, that’s it. We’ll be a good team. You look after yourself. And have faith in me.’ It seemed a strange choice of words from a senior figure more than thirty years older than her and with such greater experience. He was a likeable man but there remained something impenetrable about him. The niggle would not go away.

As she shut the door behind her, Morahan felt unease. The urge to confess the true reason for her recruitment had been almost irresistible. He tried to comfort himself; she would at least have Patrick’s protection and he was thereby honouring his commitment to her – though he still didn’t understand why the government solicitor had been so insistent on accompanying her. Sara agreed arrangements with Patrick for an early train in the morning and he’d left for the day. Alone, she tried to work out why the Inquiry’s office seemed somehow so unfamiliar, discomforting even. The only sound was the near inaudible hum of internal ventilation, breathing air into sealed units with sound-proofed windows and newly laid carpets. Not even the occasional click of shoe heels broke through. Nor voices.

That was it – the hush. In Knightly Court, there were interruptions of chatter, meetings along the corridors, the odd joke told in reception, a wheezing splutter from Ludo, the creaking of badly fitting doors. Here, in the open-plan office, there was silence; eyes glued to screens, only occasional murmured questions, overseen by the headmistressy figure of Pamela Bailly. Patrick, now she thought about it, bantered in their own office, not outside it; Sylvia, she suspected, gave up banter a while ago. Morahan himself, however forthcoming with her, was hardly gregarious. In this silence she detected not calmness, but tension.

Her phone sounded – a text. She clicked to view.

A colleague may not be what they seem.

Thought you should know. Take care.

Her heart racing, she checked the number. Not from her contacts. Not familiar. Her fingers burning, she hit reply and typed a single word.

Hello.

She awaited the ping, somehow sure of the worst.

Message sending failed.