Q = They Ate the Truth part 17

There are places, tucked away places, where you can just sit and
drink the quiet. If you're not in London, you don't really know quiet.
You need to know noise, noise that climbs into your ears and won't
release you, even for a moment, to really appreciate peace.

The quiet of towns and villages isn't the same, it is passive. The
quiet soft places of London are more than that, they resonate with
calm, with a feel like a woman's cool thin fingers sliding over your
forehead. Temple Court is one of these places. Three minutes walk from
mad roads, Holbourn and the Strand, but this is green and still. One of
my favourite places in London, this and the National History Museum,
looking up at the whale suspended from the ceiling. Peace and
perspective.

It is a similar sort of feeling you get, here in Temple where clerks
move between barristers' offices carrying goatskin paper and black
lever-arch files fastened with pink ribbon as though they were carrying
white-boxed delicate patesseries from expensive Parisian shops. In the
background, the church makes there-there noises. Although there is
activity and people there is a sense of reverence, an acknowledgement
that what we do isn't as important as the impression we leave.

I've come here to gather myself. This is the nearest thing in London to
an iceberg.

It's time. Stand up. Put the Pret a Manger sandwich carton in a bin,
swill the mouth with overpriced and English-bitter-warm water. Not far
to go.

The Royal Courts of Justice. From the outside it is like a church, a
larger Sacre Couer, though less delicate and onion-domed. But the
whiteness of it is there, and the grandeur. In a city full of
importance and bloat, this building is still somewhere to touch the
senses. I've been here before, a couple of times to give evidence in
family cases where I've had to prove that I served someone with court
papers that they later defied.

There's a reason for coming here. Once you've got past the cameras
outside hungry for divorcing celebrities, there's no cameras inside.
The building is full of space, full of knotted lawyers trying to reason
with clients who don't want to hear it, students trying to seem like
they're taking this in their stride but who can't help looking up at
the high, high ceilings in awe. This is one of the easiest places to
lose yourself. If you look right, which means crisp suit, lever-arch
file, black suit and polished shoes, nobody gives you a look. You're
damn near invisible.

And also, you have to pass through an airport-like security system
where your bags are scanned and you yourself go through a metal
detector. So, nobody gets in with a weapon.

Stop me if I'm wrong, stop me if I'm wrong.

After security, there's a lovely long wooden rack, like the ones they
have in libraries with the newspapers on, people walk down both sides
examining it closely, because this is where all the court lists are
pinned, telling people which court number they are in. I know there are
at least fifty court rooms, but there's no electronic signs showing
case names and court numbers scrolling past. If you want to know where
to be, you have to do it the old-fashioned way, or else ring Ruth at
court listing the day before and ask her where you're to go.

I know where I'm to go.

And so does Lorrie.

She's also in black suit, black pencil skirt. Her hair is brushed back,
but short, Hitchcock-blonde, with the eyes to match. Maybe more Tippi
Hedren than Grace Kelly, now I look closer. A neat smile flicks over
her face and her eyes are bright.

She looks better in this gear than I do, I still feel uncomfortable,
locked in. A quick look suggests to me that she's wearing stockings.
There's a difference in the finish you get with them to tights.

To distract myself from nerves, I pull out an old memory and take a
look at it, rotate it in my head. My father, who I know to be a bright
man, unaccountably taking the view in the mid-Eighties, after we
purchased our first video-recorder, that "Every Which Way but Loose"
was one of the finest films he'd ever seen. My mother sneezing as she
takes the top off a jar of curry powder to add heaped teaspoons of the
yellow-gray dust to cubes of bustling lamb. Me watching her move the
seeds from red peppers with the blade of her knife, neat and precise
movements.

"Alex, " she says.

I keep in character and put out a hand, barrister-style, "Ah, Miss van
Gibt. Good to see you. Right, we've a lot to talk about, shall we find
a room?"

There are some consultation rooms past the old-fashioned wooden
telephone kiosks that flare up the memory of reporters phoning back
their stories in old movies. We move into one and sit down.

"You took a risk, " I say, but can't stop myself smiling. She looks so
good.

"I thought you might be worth it, " she says, "Besides, I've always
wanted to see Kilroy's skin-tone up close. He's not as tan as you might
think. "

The thing to do seems to be to reach out and touch her wrist, I can
almost feel myself shake. I'm like a bloody teenager. This isn't the
first time I've done this.

"I was scared, " she says, "I thought I might be on my own forever.
Maybe get myself a cat, find that job as a school-teacher. Then one
day, get home with a pile of essays on Henry the Eighth to mark and
open the door to someone with a gun. "

I just hold her hand. She smells good, creamy Obsession. I remember
with a jolt that I haven't picked up any of that fragrance Alastair was
wearing. Yet another minor betrayal. Must do that.

She says, "You look bad. Oh, that sounds horrible. I mean, nice to look
at, but like you've been through it. "

I release her hand and push a hand through my hair, forgetting that I'd
put wax on it that morning to try to make myself look good. For
her.

"There's been some stuff, " I confess to her. I hate these moments when
you circle around each other, trying to see if the spark is still there
for both of you. It's still there for me, I know that. Seeing her again
just takes me.

I spent my whole life dreaming of icebergs, their purity and power. A
while back, I got to sail up near one, so close I could tell that it
was solid but fragile at the same time. Far off it was just white and
simple, but the closer I got the more subtle it seemed, I could see
rose-pinks and pale blues. I wanted to get closer still, but the
captain of the ship was fearful. He told me that you can never tell
where they start and end underwater, just like Lorrie's idea about
countries. He was okay with me wanting to look at beauty, but not mad
about dying for it.

Right there, I knew that Lorrie was the sort of iceberg I had to steer
towards. Whatever came of it, would come of it.

"You're not in danger, " I tell her, "The boy who shot at us was trying
to shoot me, not you. "

She is relieved, but nervous for me, and it is her who touches me this
time, a finger at my collarbone. I can't help but make a small sound as
she does. And then we're kissing, at first quick and hard, then deep.
And every dumb song I ever heard about love doesn't seem so dumb
anymore. I know where the feeling in the Righteous Brother's song in
the line "I hunger for your touch" comes from.

We're a long time kissing, and my hair gets ruffled and I confirm for
myself that yes, she is wearing stockings. She drags a finger over my
lips and rubs the back of her hand over my stubbled jaw.

"I like it, " she says, "Scratchy. Maybe you should grow a beard.
"

She says,"But what about you, are you still in danger?"

I tell her that I'm not, that I was able to sort things out with
Chesterton and that we will be safe. Stop me if I'm wrong, stop me if
I'm wrong.

She says, "I still can't believe you don't like jazz. You're the
smartest man I've ever met. "

"Plenty of time for me to get to like it, " I say, but I don't mean it.
On either count.

She says, "You came close, didn't you? Drinking, I mean. "

Closest for a while, I tell her. It took more out of me than I knew,
holding back. I'd give anything to be like a normal person and just be
able to get well and truly leathered once in a while after a bad day. I
get so sick of drinking Pepsi.

She kisses my neck and I start being glad I'm not a normal person after
all.

"What next? " she says.

My immediate plans involve a hotel room, just for a change. But this
time around, things are going to be more pleasant. I'm going to be far
too busy to squeeze limes.

"And after that, " I say, "We're going to see Chesterton. He's got some
stuff to tell us. "

"You're sure we're safe? " she asks.

"I'm certain that Chesterton isn't going to hurt us, " I say.

I was about to ask her whether we should go to her hotel or back to
mine, but I realise that hers must be better than mine. I only need to
go back to mine to get some of my clothes and the gun.

"Catch you in a sec, " I say, "Don't go anywhere. "

I walk down the corridor and open the door to the Gents. I take the
mobile telephone out from the inside pocket of my suit. I hate these
things. There's only one number stored in my memory, because I never
use it. I've had eighty text messages in its lifespan and never read
any of them.

"Johann, " I say, "I have the package. Tell me where and when. "