Kill and Tell Read Online Free PDF

could be in your hands, signora Sartori.’
    Appolina shivers, as if she dislikes her own name. ‘It’s nothing.’
    He un-holds Appolina, leans away and tries to fathom what it is that can keep a person – an intelligent, strong woman such as Appolina – so betrothed to a man so humble in aspiration. ‘You must tell me this thing that burdens you.’
    ‘I bear no burden. My life has been a gift.’
    ‘Where would he go? You must tell me.’
    ‘He was always with Carmelo, or here.’
    Staffe thinks:
That’s what he told you
.
    ‘We always planned to live by the sea. One day, we will, is what I always thought, but now the one day is here, and maybe it is gone. How did we get to be so old, and still tied to Carmelo?’ Appolina doesn’t look at Staffe when she says this. She is addressing somebody not here.
    ‘You’re from Sicily, too?’
    Appolina shakes her head. ‘I am a Roman. My mother warned me. Perhaps she was right.’
    ‘You met Jacobo over here? In England?’
    She smiles. ‘Carmelo introduced us. I was one of his seamstresses on the Mile End Road. They were hard times. So hard, to survive then.’
    *
    Pulford’s eyes are dark and he seems a little bloated in the face. There is something less alive about him.
    Staffe hands him the book he requested, and the photocopied article by a chap called Hutchison. He had skimmed through and it looked interesting. He wishes he had more time to dwell on the wider world; the world gone by and all its stories.
    ‘You’ve got two minutes, that’s all. You want to see him, you should book a visit like everyone else.’ The PO looks at Pulford as if he is everyday scum. ‘He’s no special case.’
    ‘He is,’ says Staffe.
    ‘No, I’m not!’ says Pulford. He seems afraid.
    Staffe watches the PO retreat to his position by the alarm bell. ‘Is that Crawshaw?’
    Pulford looks at the article and his frown softens, becoming a smile as he turns the pages.
    ‘You’re enjoying your studies?’
    ‘It makes sense of what we do, sir.’
    Staffe watches Pulford open a clear, plastic file. In the file is a printout of Google Earth, with the http: strapline at the top – clearly taken from the Internet. Pulford slides in the article. As he does, Staffe tries to see the subject of the Google Earth printout, but the Hutchison article covers it up.
    Pulford holds up the book, wiggles it and says, ‘You know, there’s nothing new in any of what we do. Crime is repeating itself, the way it always did. It used to be Caribbeans and Italians, and even the Jewish communities, who formed alliances. Now, it’s Turks and Serbs, and the old Soviet nations who come here to ply their trades. We’ve always been a melting pot, here in London.’
    ‘A land of opportunity,’ says Staffe and they both laugh.
    Crawshaw shoots a disapproving look and talks into his radio. Within a minute, a new PO appears in the visitor centre, to pat Pulford down and take him back to twenty-three-hour lockdown and the virtual world of learning; his only escape.
    When Pulford is gone, Staffe says to Crawshaw, ‘They’re not allowed the Internet in here?’
    ‘No fuckin’ way. Information is our enemy. It’s a fuckin’ killer,’ he laughs.
    At the gate, Staffe is processed back onto what Pulford is already calling ‘Road’. His mobile phone is returned and he thinks about how he should cherish every drop from every day. He makes himself call her.
    On the Pentonville Road, he finds Sylvie in his menu and he listens to her voice apologising that she isn’t around but inviting him to leave a message. She enthuses that she will call back as soon as possible. But she could be talking to anybody, so he rings off without leaving a message, walking as fast as he can down the Caledonian Road to Clerkenwell and then Leadengate, happy to feel the earth under his feet.

Five
    Staffe writes his jottings up into lists on a piece of A3. He tries to find some order amongst his own thoughts as Leadengate’s