ARAB (13 page)

“Brewster,” Diab said, laughing. “We’re to call him Brewster.”

“He thinks we’re stupid, we wouldn’t investigate him, find out his real name?”

“He aligns himself with aristocrats. He thinks he’s one of them.”

“And he thinks we’re
fellahs
?”

“Don’t stress yourself, Faisal. He’s only a messenger.”

“What does he want?”

“He didn’t say. He said only that he represents someone important.”

“And who else could that be?” Faisal said with wry sarcasm.

The voices outside faded. A door closed.

*

Around midnight Bashir stood just inside his room and listened to the retreating footsteps of the nurse who had just given him his nighttime medication. She had told him the infection was almost gone.

“There will be discomfort for a while, Bashir.”

“It’s not ‘discomfort.’ It’s pain.”

“These pills. Take them as needed.”

The moment she left the room, he got out of bed and limped to the open doorway and watched her go into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator. It’s where she kept antibiotics and the pain medicine. He would need those.

He waited until she came down the hall to her bedroom. Because the nurse’s children were asleep and Faisal was at the other end of the house, he knew he could get to the kitchen unobserved. The nurse wouldn’t be concerned if she heard him in the hallway: he had been given permission to go to the bathroom unattended.

He got his clothes from the closet, put on the denim trousers and shirt they had given him, slipped an extra sock over the bandage on his injured foot, put a shoe on his other foot, then limped to the kitchen where he took two vials of antibiotic pills and a package of Tylenol from the refrigerator. With the medication in his pocket, he limped quietly down the hall past the nurse’s room to the bathroom, closed the door and locked it.

Diab had posted guards out front but none behind the building. It was dark there. Even if he were seen, no guard would shoot him. He would be forced back into the building. Faisal needed him, he told himself, taking a deep breath, pressing his hand against his beating heart.

He raised the lower half of the window and leaned his head into the warm air outside and saw nothing but leaves and branches of banyan trees reflecting light from the front of the building. He gripped the windowsill and propelled himself onto the gravel, his legs scraping over the sill, his hands hitting the ground, arms collapsing, face smashing into the heavy gravel.

Aglow with burning pain, he waited on hands and knees and listened. Nothing moved. No sound except insect noises in the distant fields.

Bent forward in a half crouch, he limped to a banyan tree and looked back at the building. No lights came on. No one was coming after him.

A half moon like a white lop-sided stone floated over distant fields. The air smelled of manure. He limped through waist-high plants over soft earth for several hundred yards and came to a narrow road of wheel tracks. He kept looking back.

Chapter Ten

Faisal stood at the window of an upstairs apartment looking across the Nile at the sprawl of boxlike houses with minarets rising over them like ballistic missiles, everything shimmering in the August heat.

“When did that boy, the guard, escape?” he asked, not looking at Diab, not blaming him, too depressed by the news even to be angry. He hated this filthy room Diab had brought him to, fouled as it was by obscenely sweet odors of hashish.

“I’m not sure. A few days ago, three or four days. He was by himself in a room.”

“And you’ve waited until now to tell me?”

“It’s not a problem, Faisal.”

“No one was watching him?”

“He was badly hurt, Faisal. We didn’t think—”

“Well, start thinking now. He’s probably told the police everything he knows.”

“My informant will tell me what he reveals, if anything. Nothing goes on down there I don’t hear about. Besides, he doesn’t know anything. He’s just a stupid, scared kid. The police won’t hold him. When they release him we’ll pick him up. Don’t upset yourself.”

“He’s thirty years old!”

“He acts like a kid.”

“You should have shot him when I told you.” Faisal spread fingers over his chest and took several deep breaths, cursing the sweetened air. He fumbled two white pills out of his shirt pocket and tucked them under his tongue. “Does he have family, other than that grandfather those idiots shot? Didn’t they know it would bring the police? Can’t you find better men?”

“Our people are deserting every day, Faisal. We can no longer feed them. We’re lucky to have what we’ve got. Don’t worry. We’ll find the boy.”

Faisal put his hand to his chest, took a deep breath as he listened to the wail of the muezzin from across the rooftops—to him just another street noise.

“Are you all right?” Diab asked.

“Those English doctors are liars. The pain doesn’t go away. I still get shortness of breath. For no reason! I’m just standing here!”

“You’re upset,” Diab said. “Come sit down, try to relax.”

Faisal went back to the sofa and stretched out his legs, leaned back and closed his eyes.

“We’ll be here only a short time, then we’ll go back north. You were comfortable there,” Diab said.

“There are no doctors there, and until Bashir Yassin….”

“Don’t worry about Yassin. We’ll find him. He’s tamed, believe me. He’ll do whatever Jaradat wants.”

“If he’s tamed, why did he run off?”

“He’s scared, Faisal. He doesn’t know what’s happening to him. He doesn’t know why he’s been punished.”

“And we expect him to kill? Will he kill? That’s what
I
want.”

“He did once.”

“So he says. But can we believe that liar?”

“Let’s find out from Uthman. If he was connected, as he claims, to that group who brought the boy in from Gaza, he must know something about it.”

“And maybe that’s why Yassin made the story up … just to get across the border. What kind of fool is this Uthman?”

“We’ll find out.”

“He works for the government!”

“He’s paid by the People’s Assembly. I’m sure he’s paid by others. He works for whoever hires him.”

“How do we know he didn’t want this meeting so he could tell the police where I’m hiding?”

“It doesn’t matter. We’ll leave the minute he’s gone. You worry too much, Faisal. He’s too vulnerable to betray us. One word from us about his business with the insurgents and he’s a dead man. He knows that.”

“You’re too soft, Diab, too trusting. Someday it will backfire on you.”

Later, when Faisal’s security guard knocked on the door, Diab opened it a crack. “He’s here,” the guard said.

Diab pulled the door fully open, stepped back and watched a white-haired man emerge from the staircase and limp in, a man neither Diab nor Faisal had previously seen although they had dealt with him indirectly many times.

Faisal glanced at him from the sofa. “You brought my money?”

The man pinched his nostrils. “What is this room used for?”

“It’s just a room,” Faisal said.

Diab regarded the man with disdain. “You’re sure you weren’t followed?”

“Your chauffeur took great pains to be certain that we weren’t. In fact, he was quite amusing, darting in and out of alleys, little side streets. He’s quite a fellow.”

Faisal got up and stood in front of a noisy air-conditioner eyeing the white cotton suit, the shirt and necktie. He watched the man lower himself into a straight-backed chair, prop a black cane upright between his knees and fondle the silver knob with bony fingers. He seemed nervous, eager to get this meeting overwith, intimidated perhaps by Faisal’s reputation for cruelty.

“Who do you work for?” Faisal said.

“Oh, many, many people,” flicking that off with indifference.

“Right now, on this, who are you working for?”

“I never know. It’s not the way it’s done,” dismissing the question.

The paper-thin condescension infuriated Faisal. Who the hell did this limping runt think he was? Some kind of respectable businessman? He arranges murders! He’s lower than a pimp!

“Who hired you to come here?”

A little smile touched the man’s eyes, “Oh, they never say. I’m contacted by telephone. I send a man to a meeting place for instructions. I don’t know anything but what I’m told.”

“And just what have you been told. And who told you?”

“I don’t believe you’re listening, sir. I have no idea who I’m representing. I was asked to find out whether a certain young man, a pilot I believe, is ready. And I don’t know what is meant by ‘ready.’ I assume you do.”

“A pilot? They said a pilot?” He glanced questioningly at Diab.

“They said only a name—Bashir Yassin. I just happen to know he’s a pilot.”

“But they didn’t say pilot?” Diab asked.

The man cast a nervous glance at Diab, then leaned forward on his cane, placed his right hand on his knee and pushed himself to his feet. “I’m not here, Mr. Ibrahim, to talk about my business. I’ve been commissioned to ask how compliant this Bashir Yassin has become. I’m told that my principal will want him delivered soon. And I’m to give you this Vodaphone number.” He handed Diab a folded slip of paper. Diab tucked it into his shirt pocket.

“Can you tell me the condition of Bashir Yassin? I assume he’s been ill.”

“Tell your ‘principal’ that Bashir is ready to do whatever he wants. But first I will be paid. Tell him that. Tell him I will take half my pay now before I deliver Bashir to him.”

Uthman seemed to absorb every word, his expression tight with apprehension. He nodded vigorously, nervously. He was standing at the door, his hand on the knob, a contrived smile on his face. As though eager to escape, he opened the door. Women’s voices filled the staircase.

“Close the door!” Faisal yelled.

Startled by the command, Uthman hesitated. He staggered back when Diab reached across him and pushed the door closed.

Badly frightened, the man said, “I don’t know anything. I’m just a facilitator.”

Diab dropped a hand on Uthman’s shoulder, leaned down and whispered to his face. “Who pays you?”

Uthman pulled back as though in pain.

“You’re an expendable man, Mr. Ajami,” Faisal said. “Yes, we know your name. We know many things about you. A word from us and this little world of yours will collapse.”

“Or the police might find your corpse rotting in this room,” Diab said.

“My god! What kind of people are you? I can’t tell you anything! I don’t know anything! I never do! It’s not how it works!”

“What are Jaradat’s plans for Bashir Yassin?”

“Jaradat?”

“You think I don’t know who sent you?”

“You mean Colonel Jaradat?” He seemed truly confounded.

Diab raised a foot and kicked the cringing man’s knee.

Howling in pain, bent over, grasping his leg, Uthman yelled, “I’m just a facilitator!”

“How do you get paid? Don’t you know who pays you?”

“I receive a money order from an Austrian bank. No signatures.”

“Does Jaradat want Bashir Yassin to kill anyone?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about? Please!”

“You know Yassin. You know he’s a pilot. What else do you know about him?”

“I know he’s wanted by the Israelies? I know he killed three rabbis in Jerusalem.”

“How did you know that?”

“Please! I’m trying to help you. I facilitated his coming into Egypt.”

“And who told you to do that?”

“I don’t know! I don’t question people who seek my services. I was told he needed asylum. He was a boy. It was years ago.”

“Well, you’ll know who told you this,” Faisal said. “If you tell the police where I am, I’ll feed you to swine. You understand?” Faisal turned away in disgust. “Get him out of here.”

Diab tightened his hold on the man’s shoulder. “Those women on the stairs will not remember us. But they will remember a white-haired man coming alone into this room. Lots of old men come alone into this room.”

“Please!”

Diab opened the door, flattened his hand on Uthman’s back and pushed him into the hall. He watched the limping man make his way slowly down the stairs past the women.

An hour later, on the highway going north to Zagazig, Faisal said, “You have to promise me, Diab, on the soul of God, that you will see that Bashir Yassin kills Aziz al-Khalid. I don’t care what Jaradat wants. It’s the man who betrayed my son I want dead. You must promise me, Diab.”

“Of course, I promise,” Diab said. “But nothing’s going to happen to you. You’ll see it. You have many years….”

Faisal leaned back, adjusting the white
kaffiyeh
he had put on his head to disguise himself. “You have any idea where Yassin went? He has to be in hiding from the police. Why are they looking for him? Why did they go after that boy?”

“I don’t know. I know only that his name was mentioned by Captain Ajami when they were at that house.”

“The boy didn’t see him?”

“The boy knows nothing about Bashir Yassin. He’s just a stupid—”

“So where is he? How about that place he stayed when he got that airport job? The two women who took him in? Or was that a lie?”

“He needs you, Faisal. When he finds out the police are looking for him, and not just the city police, the
muccabarrat.
They searched his apartment. He’s a fugitive. He’s in this country illegally. You’re the only refuge he has. He’ll come back. He has to come back.”

“The infection? How bad is it?”

“She said it’s almost healed. He has those pills, but they’ll run out. Don’t worry. He’s healthy enough to do whatever we want. He’s been tamed, Faisal. He’s an ambitious man. He knows he can’t betray you. He loves the good life too much to go off on his own. He has no contacts, no money. He has to please you to survive.”

“What if he finds out it’s Jaradat behind this? He’ll want to please him.”

“He has no future with Jaradat. He knows his future is with you. He has no contacts. There’s no one out there he can trust.”

Faisal took a deep breath, his hand on his chest as he slid his buttocks forward, lowering himself on the seat. “I’m too old for this. I’m sick. I’m retired. Why can’t they leave me alone?”