Free The Convenience of Lies by Geoffrey Seed

call for the frogmen’s search of the reservoir. But Hoare knew a theatrical agent who could lay on a Ruby look-alike for a reconstruction of her last known movements.
    ‘We’ll get terrific press pictures and better TV coverage.’
    ‘Great idea,’ Benwick said. ‘Glad I thought of it.’
    Hoare saw McCall crossing the street towards Café Leila in a blue cotton jacket and stone-coloured Chinos. McCall always looked nervy and drawn but that morning, seemed even more so. Hoare bought him a coffee and asked for a receipt.
    ‘OK, I’ve talked to The Sunday Telegraph,’ McCall said. ‘They want twelve-hundred words and pictures on Ruby.’
    ‘That’s a whole page.’
    ‘Yes, I sold the idea hard but I must have the mother exclusive, Malky. The piece won’t work otherwise.’
    ‘I’ll talk to Benwick. It should bring a smile to his face but don’t bet the farm on it.’
    ‘So what else can you give me for old time’s sake?’
    ‘Listen, Mac. You can’t keep leaning on me like this. I’ll give you Benwick’s mobile number and his confidential direct line then that’s it. Debt paid.’
    Hoare left to meet Benwick for a final briefing with the frogmen who would search the reservoir. Despite their friendship, McCall didn’t trust Hoare enough to tell him about Ruby’s brilliant artworks, still less that he was her aunt’s lover.
    He stayed in the cafe to write up his notes about what he’d already observed of Ruby’s habitat - its litter, the dog shit, kebab smells, noise, traffic, the roaming neighbourhood kids from whose unthinking cruelty she sought escape in a private fantasia of castles and princesses. Such a child with such an imagination - and so rare a talent - could hardly be of this world and might already be in the next. That was the tragedy unfolding here which was why her story was so compelling.
    ‘You are from the newspapers, yes… about Ruby?’
    McCall looked up. A woman stood over him, late middle age, white apron, darting eyes and scraped-back hair reddened by henna.
    ‘Yes, I’m writing about Ruby. Did you know her?’
    ‘I am Leila. This is my place. Ruby come and have food here almost every day.’
    She sat down beside him. Her long, geranium-coloured nails dug into the flesh of her palms as she told him about an unlikely friendship.
    ‘I never send Ruby away. Not me. Always hungry, no playmates. Her mother, not good woman, don’t deserve Ruby.’
    ‘Why wasn’t she a good woman?’
    ‘Men come to her, all times. Many men. Sorry but it’s truth. If only Ruby visit me that day… but no… and now all this.’
    ‘Sounds like you were very fond of her.’
    ‘Yes… such a strange child, like no other… so clever but no one knew.’
    ‘In what way was she clever?’
    ‘Listen, you come. You come with me.’
    McCall followed her upstairs to living quarters furnished like the inside of a gypsy caravan – prints of snowy mountains, vases of artificial flowers, two plaster dogs either side of a gas fire. She unhooked a framed pencil portrait from the wall.
    ‘See this? This is me.’
    It was Leila all right – hooded eyes, laugh-lined and knowing, slightly Semitic nose and an alluring, full lipped smile, generous and kind.
    ‘Ruby did this of me.’
    ‘What, she sat you down and drew you?’
    ‘No, from memory she does this. She just come in one day and give it me. Believe me, if Ruby die, some of me die, too.’
    *
    Viewed from the reservoir’s edge, the very stillness of such a huge volume of water appeared threatening. Hoare figured it would take him at least twenty, twenty-five minutes just to walk the cinder path around it.
    He lit another cigarette and sent the match fizzing into the reeds. The rain was holding off but a bank of cloud started massing behind the battlements of the pumping station. Benwick approached shaving his chin with a battery razor.
    ‘Another night on the tiles?’
    ‘I wish,’ Benwick said. ‘Big day, today. You all set?’
    ‘The kid