Read Online No Place of Safety by Robert Barnard - Free Book Online Page A

fault . . . No, that’s not true: of course it’s his fault, of course he should not think of selling his daughter to a repulsive old lecher. But he is under a lot of pressure. It’s not just him and us: it’s the whole large family, people who depend on him for a not very good living. The longer I can remain vanished, the more I can escape the pressures from him and them, and the more he’ll be forced to find another way out of his difficulties.’
    â€˜Yes, I can see that,’ Ben said, his face screwed up in contemplation. ‘How did you get to hear about us?’
    â€˜From a schoolfriend. She was on the streets for a bit, when her mum had a new boyfriend who was harassing her.’
    â€˜You know, don’t you, that we’re a refuge for the homeless – ’
    â€˜I am homeless!’
    â€˜In a sense.’ Ben hadn’t lost his cool. ‘But we’re really for young people who have been on the streets for a while.’
    â€˜If I sleep rough, my father will find me.’
    â€˜What I’m saying is that there are places for people in your situation. I’m pretty sure there’s one in Bradford for Asian women who are being pressurized into unwanted marriages or fleeing from unhappy ones.’
    The glint was now steely in Midge’s eye.
    â€˜I am not an Asian woman. I am a British woman who happens to be brown-skinned and Moslem. If I am a Moslem.’
    â€˜I think you know what I mean, Midge.’
    His calmness and persistence lowered the temperature, as it usually did.
    â€˜Yes, I know what you mean. But can you see it from my point of view? Try ! Why should I be compartmentalized, made into a typical problem of my community?’
    â€˜Well, there aren’t many white British girls who are forced into marriage these days.’
    It was said lightly. Midge saw the joke, and grinned.
    â€˜I suppose what you’re really saying is that I’m a bit of an embarrassment to you in the work you’re trying to do.’
    Ben didn’t try any facile denial.
    â€˜A bit of a problem, anyway. Something we’re not really used to. And you could give a handle to people who will use any ammunition they can get against us.’
    â€˜I can’t see how giving protection to someone like me could provide ammunition for anyone.’
    â€˜No. How could it?’ put in Katy loyally.
    Ben explained patiently.
    â€˜Anything involving the ethnic minorities can be sensitive. There’s the point too that other places, like the Bradford refuge, can offer you much better advice than we can. They’ll have specialist people there, or at any rate on call. That’s what you need – people to tell you your legal rights, to tell you what, with all their experience, is the best way of fighting this thing. Experience tells, you know.’
    â€˜Ye-e-es.’
    â€˜Look, I’ll try to find out their number, and then we can at least make contact with them. Remember, there’s a fortnight limit on stays here, and I can’t see why we should make an exception for you.’
    There was a pause. Mehjabean’s incipiently beautiful face registered the pressures of differing emotions and impulses. Finally she said: ‘All right.’ All of them conscious that she didn’t have a great deal of choice. She knew they would not want to throw her out, but equally she knew she needed to retain Ben’s goodwill.
    Getting in touch with the refuge for Asian women proved not to be child’s play. Ben remembered a journalist contacton the Bradford Telegraph and Argus , but when he finally found him at his desk the man was adamant that the phone number was something that simply was not given out, not even to a trusted friend. Ben kept his cool, and finally the man came up with a compromise.
    â€˜Look, the number’s sacrosanct, just as the address is. You don’t have to be Albert Einstein to guess why. But