An International Espionage Thriller Book Series

Lies And Consequences by Daniel Kemp

Series Excerpt

The house was a small, red-bricked terraced affair with a well-cared-for short, front garden in a dead end, tree-lined street no more than five minutes ride from the station. The twenty-minute train journey had passed uneventfully with only a few passengers travelling southwards at that time of morning and even fewer alighting at Twickenham. I was met by a medium-built man, dressed head to foot in black leathers on a motorcycle who, apart from asking my name, spoke not another single word as he passed me a blue helmet then took it from me when we arrived outside number 14 Merton Road. It had been raining hard on the journey from London and the trees were still shedding wa-ter in the wind. Jack Price stood sheltering in the open doorway!

“Why am I here, Jack?” I asked as he stretched out a welcoming hand.

“Because you wanted to come, Patrick, it’s your dream job,” he added as I accepted his greeting.

“Did I make that choice when I was asleep and before you changed my name?” I asked as he smiled in that condescending fashion I was beginning to know.

“Your name is to be Shaun Redden but we’ll come to that in time, and yes, you made a choice the minute you met me. I note that you decided not to mention Edward Heath being in Alhambra’s club when you reported to Suffolk Street. It was a lie of course, but you never knew that. You did the right thing without thinking too deeply. Firstly we survive and secondly we think of our-selves. Do you follow that?”

“Not at all! One follows the other. One cannot survive without thinking of oneself first. How did you know that I never mentioned Heath in the report I handed in this morning?”

“I had it read, of course. You don’t think I’d let something like that go forward without my approval, did you? By the way did you spot those two men following you, or, were just allowing them to believe you hadn’t?”“Truth is, Jack, I never saw a soul.”

“Hmm, although I always appreciate the truth I was hoping that you had spotted them. You don’t have to beat yourself up too much, though; they were good. Quite professional.”

“I didn’t warrant the very good then?” He chose not to answer that ques-tion.

“No one is more important than each, Shaun. You will learn that. That’s what we do! We look after those who need looking after that nobody else wants to touch,” he declared, making no further comment on my report.

“You never answered my question about being turned back in Vienna. Shall we start there, Jack?” He closed the door behind me without answering that question either. Although I was irritated by his reluctance to respond to my queries, it wasn’t simple petulance. It was because I imagined there still to be a choice available to join him or not, but if there had been a choice, I was never strong enough to exercise it.

“Leave the paperwork you were given on the stand in the hallway, Shaun. It’s time for a new beginning. Come through.”

I slavishly followed him along a lighted narrow corridor lined with torpid, hanging boating prints on sleepy, white painted walls into a double lounge with a casement window to the front and two other such, but smaller, windows to the rear overlooking a grassed garden with a high wooden fence. All three windows had curtains that were drawn back. In the centre of a speckled linole-um-covered floor was a square dining table surrounded by four, red padded upright chairs. There was one other piece of furniture in this part of the room; a sideboard, on which were two packets of unopened cigarettes and a half full metal ashtray. A yellow settee, with two matching yellow armchairs, an ob-long occasional table and a television set were in the other half of the lounge.

“Tea or coffee, Shaun?”

“You mean to say that there’s a kitchen to add to the opulence of this house, Jack? Are there many more rooms full of surprises?”

“It’s not much is it, but it does for what’s required. There’s a kitchen along with three functional bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs with all the necessary facilities. Enough practicality for the short time you’ll be here. We prefer to move around quite frequently.”

“By ‘we’ you mean there’s more than just you and the three I’ve met so far then?”

“More than you’d imagine, but not too many to clog the system.”

“Does Trenchard know that I’m here?”

“Nobody knows exactly where you are other than me, Shaun. But that’s not the question you should be asking.”

“What is then?”

“Why did Trenchard select you in the first place?”

“You invited me here, Jack.”

“True, but it was he who dropped you in my lap. I can’t imagine him having the brains or balls to do that alone. I had a tip-off to be in Charing Cross Road from an entirely different source unconnected to you or him and what’s more, I never made a statement to any copper. You didn’t think of checking that, did you?”

I was struck dumb, having believed everything Trenchard had told me, even the signature.

“I’ve told you how I knew about the timing of the robbery. How about C11? How did Trenchard know?” he asked.

“That’s easy! I told him, Jack. The car front where I work took the cars in as part exchange on the Wednesday and as always they were parked in the company’s lock-up yard half a mile away from the showrooms in Iverson Road. The keys were left behind the sun visors with the yard locked. That night I gave Murry a copy of the gate keys I’d already made. The yard was not going to be used that Thursday as both mechanics, who were brothers, were going to their mum’s funeral. Neither car was missed until Friday morning, by which time they had been impounded. The local uniform made enquiries on Friday but it was written up as incompetence by someone from the garage or the showroom. I was never questioned about it.”

“Well, you’re here now, Shaun, so let’s leave the full reasons for why till another time. Is it the tea or the coffee you want?”

As I answered ‘tea’ I heard a water tap begin to run and then, seconds after, a kettle start to boil. Next came a woman’s voice with a heavy Irish inflection asking, “Will you be taking sugar in that tea, Shaun?”

Taking the chair at the end of the table that looked directly at the closed kitch-en door, I answered, “No, thank you, but if there’s any whisky a drop would not come amiss,” then turning my attention back towards Jack I continued, “perhaps, the whisky might help me make sense of all this.”

“I think it might take more than one measure in your tea, Shaun. Think on this whilst you’re waiting; why did Trenchard want you and me in the same place, do you think? He’s obviously getting instructions from outside offices and I reckon they have been running you since your days at Oxford, but every cloud has a pewter lining as they say. At least you’re at the same place both they and you want.”

“Speaking of places, was that place of yours in Soho, Jack, just a façade with the family snaps laid on to fool me?”

“It was a place I use occasionally if the purpose suits me, but the photo-graphs were not meant to confuse or coerce you in any sense. I don’t believe Barrington was relying on any sympathy you may have had for my marital sta-tus swinging your vote in my direction.”

“He knew of it though, the flat and your family, Jack?”

“I have used it before and my family issues are not a secret, Shaun,” he answered.

“I’m becoming a mite peeved by this Shaun business. Can we make a start on clearing that up?”

“I will get to it, but for now I’m sizing you up. Are you here for the ex-citement I can undoubtedly provide, or are you a mole sent to infiltrate my or-ganisation for the benefit of Barrington Trenchard and his friends? I watched you before the event in Charing Cross Road, during it and then, more im-portantly, after it. Not once did you hesitate or show any remorse for killing that man, Shaun. Does Trenchard want to give you a role where you’re the sheriff, judge and hangman all rolled into one?”

“How did you know of me before I shot that man, Jack?”

He had my fascination and attention and he knew it as he took his place at the opposite end of the table, studying me carefully.

“Have you ever noticed how a poor child will scream his head off if de-prived of a toy, but the child from a wealthy house will merely complain slightly, knowing that he will easily find one of many thing to play with? You’re not screaming a single decibel, Shaun, in fact, you’re wallowing in all of this mystery having found yourself in the biggest stack of toys imaginable. I did think you might do more than just ask where you were being taken this morning. But no! Not even a whimper of protest. Not wishing to repeat my-self, but not a single tear shed for the Irishman you shot dead? And don’t tell me it was in the line of duty. I’ve seen men take lives, Shaun. I know a cold-blooded killer when I see one. Now is the time to see if you have a calm head in times of crisis, or merely the fool impressed by gun-firing adventures.” He was smiling confidently as he spoke.

If he had worn last night’s clothes as a uniform to impress, then today held no reason for the making of impressions. He was in casual clothes, albeit bespoke rather than bought off-the-peg. It was the truth he spoke about me trying to fight against the temptation he offered, but it was a losing battle and one I had no heart for. Reaching for the ashtray, he placed it on the table and offered me a cigarette. I tried to hide that previously mentioned obedient compliance of mine as I took it, placing my own brand in front of myself with my one prized possession, a Dunhill lighter, on top. It was a defiant statement; denying I had been bought for the price of a single smoke.

“Did you really believe that I would swallow the Edward Heath story, Jack? Because if you did then you’re the fool here, not me. Why are you avoiding that question of mine about Vienna? I’d like to know if you were turned and if so, whose side I’m being recruited to work for.”

“I’ll have to work harder on telling lies, Shaun. I must be slipping in my dotage!” laughingly he replied.

Again my question about alliances was avoided as the mysterious kitchen voice entered carrying a tray laden with a teapot, mugs and milk in the bottle. The door crashed shut behind her, making her entrance even more theatrical.

“By turned, are you suggesting that a true Englishman such as Mr Price might have had his fidelity diverted from the imperial path of colonialism to-wards what could it be now; the hammer and sickle of Communism, or per-haps you’re implying a sparkling star and striped future of abundance and gratitude? If so, then I’ll answer for the man who sits before us accused of treachery. No, is the answer. Here’s your tea, Shaun! I’ll be fetching your bot-tle of Ireland’s finest whiskey sometime later tonight after I’ve formally been introduced to my younger brother. I’m Fianna Redden, by the way.”

My head was swimming with the colourful imagery and the lyrical prose de-livered from a derisive face that stared unerringly at me without blinking her cold fixed eyes. As the tray was placed on the table, she continued without an intake of breath.

“Born in 1947, before you’ll be asking me age. Originally from Carrick-On-Shannon, Co. Leitrim, but coming here by way of varied paths that started at an orphanage in Athlone. Before today you were only Irish through your mother, Shaun, but today’s your lucky day. Now you’re the Irish brother of an Athenian goddess.” At last she looked away, standing to her full height and bracing her back defiantly as she admired the reflection she made in the win-dow.

“Perhaps it could be said that I’m not blessed with that goddess’s wis-dom, but certainly her beauty, if beautiful indeed she was! Stand and kiss your sister at once, or I’ll be pouring the tea all over yer.” she finished.

Her heart-shaped face, with its small, dimpled pointed chin, shone in the wa-tery sunlight. Her predatory amber, wide-spaced eyes were transparent pools of gold that adorned her freckled fair skin, lined with laughter lines which etched the story of a full life. Seemingly someone who gave away smiles like they were wishes. Yet there was a subtlety to that amber gaze trying to conceal the most sorrowful face I had ever seen. Here was a woman who had lost what she knew she could not afford to lose, and the knowing did not soften the deso-lation.

“Did she have a temper, this goddess from Athlone?” I asked as I stood and faced her.

“Now there’s a silly question for a handsome man to ask a woman and no mistake. Did you see Maureen O’Hara in The Quiet Man, Shaun? I’m her reincarnated. Of course I do, and a wicked one at that. There will be no sense in the finding out.”