No Mortal Thing: A Thriller by Gerald Seymour Read Free Book Online

the staircase down two floors.
    When Fred stood behind the woman at Reception he could see, distorted by the stains on the glass, the bank worker. A nice-looking boy, good build and features. He asked the woman and was told he had been there close to an hour. The ‘kids’ would have held it up: smart-arse idiots. She told him which interview room was empty.
    He went through the security door.
    He said briskly, ‘I am sorry you have been kept waiting so long. Follow me, please . . .’
     
    ‘Do sit down.’ He gave a suspicion of a smile, an empty pleasantry. ‘Now, how can I help you? Excuse me, you are English? Do you speak German?’
    Jago said, ‘I have adequate German. You could have helped me a while ago by coming to find out why I was here. So, sometimes your language, sometimes mine.’
    ‘A good compromise . . . and I apologise. Communications in the building are not always satisfactory . . . How can I help?’
    ‘Are you always so cavalier with the time of people who bother to report a crime? Or is that bad for the clear-up figures?’
    ‘I’ve already apologised . . .’
    ‘There’s a phrase in England that all those public utility companies – or the police – use when they keep you hanging on a phone and have likely failed you. ‘We take your complaint very seriously.’ But I’m a member of the public and, although I’m a foreigner, I’m registered here as a taxpayer. So I pay your salary – or a fraction of it.’
    The smile widened, might even have been touched by genuine humour. In the corridor, before getting to the interview room, they had introduced themselves. The investigator, Fred Seitz, was tall and thin, the skin sagging below his cheekbones. His throat was scrawny and his jacket hung loose from angular shoulders. His scalp was discoloured and his hair cut short. Jago estimated him to be in his mid-fifties.
    He told his story.
    ‘Is that all you saw?’
    ‘I’ve told it as I saw it.’
    ‘And described accurately the injuries to you and the girl?’
    ‘I believe so.’
    The investigator had produced a notepad and pencil but had written only a line at the top of the page, then closed it. Now it had gone back into his pocket, with the pencil. He produced a pipe, which whistled as he sucked the stem. ‘What do you expect me to do?’
    ‘As a police officer, I expect you to investigate the assault, interview the girl concerned, follow that up, identify our assailant, then arrest and charge him.’
    ‘Are you widely travelled, Mr Browne?’
    ‘Not particularly.’
    ‘But you are aware of the Italian diaspora – of course you are.’
    Jago said sharply, ‘I know many Italians live here. I have eyes in my head.’
    ‘You have not visited Italy?’
    ‘No. Does that make me an inferior witness to criminal acts?’
    ‘I understand, Mr Browne, your irritation with my questions. I assure you they are relevant.’
    ‘I’ve given you chapter and verse on a crime.’
    ‘You want me to be honest?’
    ‘Does honesty mean evasion, denial, what we call “sweeping under the carpet”, too unimportant for you to—’
    ‘Allow me to be honest . It’s always good to speak the truth, even when it’s unpalatable.’
    The smile had broadened. The investigator had pushed back his chair and stood up. His police pistol, in a grubby holster, was against his hip, his shirt was not clean, he wore no tie and his trousers were crumpled. At the Plaistow police station, where they handled Canning Town, they would have been red-faced at his rudeness. He thought the man didn’t give a damn.
    ‘Mr Browne, in Germany we are a colony of Italy. Not of the Italian state but of the various arms of the Italian Mafia. They bring their customs, behaviour and daily habits inside our frontiers. Although they live in Germany they don’t change their culture. It’s a ghetto life. They exploit the lax legislation concerning criminal association and they do well – extremely well. In Germany, the