TURKISH DELIGHT Barry Faulkner (i love reading txt) 📖

look like invoices, plus some peculiar obituaries and what I hope is an answer to who our look-a-like lady is. Where’s your car?’

‘Up the road in the underground car park.’

We made our way out of the crowded foyer, Gold remembering to limp a little in case the doorman was around and recognised her, and then across the pedestrian crossing to the Hyde Park side of Park Lane and along to the car park. Parking your motor nearby or inside the car park of the place you are targeting is a basic no-no, as the Hatton Garden safe deposit thieves found out to their cost with Kenny’s white Mercedes!

We pulled out onto Park Lane.

‘Where to?’

‘The office, I want to scan these pics and print them off.’

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At the Borough she parked in her space in the basement and we went up to the office. I switched on the printer; it’s one of those that scans, prints, copies, does the washing up, hoovers the flat and orders a take away – I wish.

I plugged my phone in and scanned the photos picking out the ones from the Hilton to print. I did the Turkish paper one first, enlarging it to A4 size which made it easy to read. I took it out of the tray as the other page photos started to come through.

Gold picked up the others and laid them out on the desk.

‘Interesting,’ she said.

‘What is?’ I asked.

She waved a hand to silence me and opened up my desk laptop. ‘There’s a pattern – give me some time, I’m going to dig around. Don’t interrupt. Pen.’

I gave her a pen and writing pad from the desk drawer and sat opposite. I’d seen her do this before; her cyber experience in Mossad had given her a pretty good idea of where on the net and dark web to go to get answers. Her fingers flashed over the keyboard and every now and then she made notes. I craned forward to read them.

‘Go away, you’re putting me off.’

I retreated to the kitchen and made two cups of coffee –French type, not even a nod of thanks when I put hers on the desk. I took mine and stood by the window, watching the people and traffic in the high street below. Everybody down there had a home, a life, a story, maybe a family; most would have problems too, money, marriage, job, health. And there we all were, thrown together by this thing called fate to be in the same place on the same planet at the same time; and we’d never know each other than by a passing glimpse maybe. I bet there’s some great stories walking along Borough High Street.

Ten minutes of that was enough – my imagination was getting the better of me. I went back to my chair, unnoticed by Gold. I should have taken an Evening Standard paper off the free stand at the front of the building. Not only was I bored, I was getting hungry too.

‘Back in ten minutes – don’t answer the phone,’ I instructed Gold. She nodded without giving me a glance, not that she would answer the phone. I picked up the printed page with the Turkish identity at the top and left.

A hundred metres down the Borough High Street from the office I pushed open the door to the Kurzine restaurant; it was still early for diners so Mehmet, the owner was arranging his wine bottles behind the bar. His kebab bars turned slowly, taking the heat from their upright grilles and dripping fat into the trays beneath. He smiled when he saw me.

‘Mr Nevis, how are you sir? You haven’t been here lately.’

‘Hello Mehmet.’ We shook hands. ‘I’ve been away. I want two tasty doner kebabs with salad and some advice.’

Mehmet said something in Turkish to one of the staff who attended to the kebabs, putting two flatbreads into the toaster and slicing down the shards of meat into a tray.

Mehmet turned back to me. ‘Advice? What advice can I give you? You want to know how to make a kebab?’ He laughed.

I gave him the Turkish page. ‘Tell me what this is all about.’

He read the page, every now and again he raised his eyes and looked at me with a worried expression. When he finished reading it he slowly put the paper down on the counter and looked at me. He spoke slowly, ‘This is official Turkish Government business, not for you. This is trouble.’

‘Trouble?’

‘This lady they talk about, she is government employee – government defence ministry employee, she is a very high up person in army. Where you get this, Mr Nevis? This it says top secret at top.’ He pointed to some words. ‘This about missiles and working with Republic Guard in Iran – this is dangerous. Burn it, Mr Nevis – burn it.’

‘What’s her name?’

He looked down to the paper. ‘Aydin, Serife Aydin.’

‘You are a star Mehmet, thank you.’ I took back the paper.

The chap at the kebab counter called over, asking if I wanted sauce – of course I did, you can’t have a kebab without the traditional sauce.

I paid Mehmet, who was still looking at me through worried eyes as he made a great pretence of not accepting my money, but he always does that and he always takes it in the end.

‘No no no, you get free, Mr Nevis,’ he said, raising his palms towards me. It’s been like that since the day four years ago when I went in for a takeaway and found panic in the place. Mehmet’s fourteen year-old daughter had disappeared at the same time as one of his young counter assistants; he’d tried to stamp out the relationship and sacked the boy, but as usual with kids that had made it worse and now his daughter