The Truth Read Online Free PDF Page B

men with radical tendencies, and despite the fact that she was Home Counties metropolitan and he a wary Northerner they’d always got along pretty well. She had done her best to nurture his investigative tendencies, but when the well had dried up she’d used her contacts to find him work in the steady if unspectacular world of company commissions. Mabbut was not successful enough to claim her whole attention and she was not close enough to him to be part of the rest of his life. On this basis, their chummy but undemanding relationship had ticked along nicely. Until today, when Mabbut sensed that something had changed. Her big green eyes were wider than usual and her sturdy, broad features betrayed an unfamiliar bounce. Silla was excited.
    She laid her phone on the table, throwing it a meaningful glance as she did so.
    ‘That was Ron Latham.’
    He frowned.
    ‘Ron Latham. Urgent Books. Used to be with Waddilow and Bowler until they became Herald and Barker. Did the Flapjacks.’
    Mabbut knew the name, but from the business, not the literary, pages.
    ‘He’s one of the biggest players now. Stacks of money behind him.’
    Mabbut’s eyes narrowed. Silla clinked her glass against his with such abandon that it was clear it wasn’t her first.
    ‘And he’s after you.’
    ‘What for?’
    But Silla was off again, leafing through the menu then waving at the waitress.
    ‘Let’s order,’ she barked.
    They both chose the day’s special. He drank his glass of wine and half the bottle she later ordered. She remained almost coquettishly mysterious about the matter in hand, and only politely interested as he expanded on his novel, so they talked about this and that, and a small fight outside the Spanish club farther down the street provided some unexpected entertainment. An hour later Silla switched on her phone, and kissed him briefly.
    ‘I’ll see you tomorrow morning.’
    ‘Look, Silla, you’ve torpedoed my first day on Albana— ’
    ‘On what?’
    ‘ Albana . The novel ! Remember?’
    Silla pushed back her chair and stood up, smiling crisply.
    ‘Not a good title, by the way.’
    She waved the bill.
    ‘Albania or Nirvana. You can’t have both. Excuse me!’
    The lovely Croatian switched off her mobile and came towards them.
    ‘It’s a working title.’
    ‘We had one bottle of water. The rest was tap, I think.’
    Mabbut persisted. ‘I can’t let you sabotage my second day.’
    ‘There. Two San Pellegrinos. We only had one.’
    The waitress looked down at the bill for some time, as if trying to decipher ancient runes.
    ‘OK. I change.’
    Silla reached for her coat.
    ‘The life of a writer is unlike any other, Keith. It’s lonely, it’s unpredictable, it’s blown by the winds.’
    ‘So?’
    ‘A writer’s mind must never be closed. It’s his duty to be curious and my duty to feed that curiosity. Think of it as the start of a big adventure.’
    She gave him a brisk, breathy hug.
    ‘Meeting’s at eleven. Pick you up at ten.’
    ‘I’ll take the Tube.’
    She frowned.
    ‘They’re in darkest Southwark, darling.’
    For Silla public transport was a foreign country. She shook her hair, pulled on a beret and smiled reassuringly.
    ‘I’ll send Hector.’
    Which was exactly why Mabbut had suggested taking the Tube.

FOUR
     
    S illa Caldwell was one of the few writer’s agents who still employed a driver. This was partly to do with an old-fashioned concern over image and partly because a year or so previously she’d totalled her own car after a carafe too many with a Swedish thriller writer. No one had been hurt and it was quite likely she would have got away with it had the car she’d hit not had a policeman in it. With a deftly mixed cocktail of charm and remorse Silla had avoided public opprobrium and all who knew her reckoned she’d been very lucky indeed. Apart from the loss of a colourfully eccentric Alfa Spyder, the only real penalty she’d incurred was the arrival of Hector Fischer in her