Deception on His Mind (22 page)

“Quite true,” he said.

“Right. So, what if he was set to meet a lover the night he died? And what if the family found out about it?” When Azhar frowned, looking doubtful, she said, “He had three condoms in his pocket, Azhar. What does that suggest to you?”

“A preparation for intercourse.”

“Not a love affair? A love affair significant enough to cause Querashi to want to call off his wedding plans?”

“It might be that Haytham had fallen in love with someone else,” Azhar replied. “But love and duty are often mutually exclusive ideas to my people, Barbara. Westerners think of marriage as the logical consequence of love. Most Asians do not. Thus Haytham may have fallen in love with another woman—and possession of the condoms suggests he went to the Nez for purposes of sex if not for purposes of love, I will agree—but it does not follow that he would wish to abrogate his agreement to marry my cousin.”

“Okay. I'll accept that for the moment.” Barbara dropped a square of toast onto her plate and forked it about in the remaining yolk of her egg. She knifed it up with some bacon and chewed thoughtfully, considering alternative scenarios. When she had one, she spoke, aware of the fact that Azhar was frowning. No doubt he was assessing her table manners, which at breakfast left something to be desired. She was used to eating on the run and had never got out of the habit of bolting down her breakfast as if pursued by Mafia hitmen. “Then what if he'd got some woman pregnant? Condoms don't always work the way one would like. They leak, they break, they're not put on in time.”

“If she was pregnant, why did he have condoms with him that night? They'd've hardly been necessary.”

“Right. Closing the barn door too late,” Barbara agreed. “But he might not have known she was in the club. He went prepared to do the dirty as usual, and she broke the news to him when he got there. So she's pregnant and he's engaged to someone else. What then?”

Azhar stubbed out his cigarette. He lit another before answering. “That would be unfortunate.”

“Okay. Good. So let's imagine it happened. Wouldn't the Maliks—”

“But Haytham would still consider himself contracted to Sahlah,” he said patiently. “And the family would consider the pregnancy to be the responsibility of the woman. Since she'd likely be English—”

“Hang on,” Barbara cut in, her dander up at this blithe assumption. “Why would she
likely
be anything? How would he know any English women, anyway?”

“This is your conjecture, Barbara, not mine.” It was clear that he read her vexation. It was also clear that he wasn't bothered by it. “She'd likely be English because young Asian women are careful about their virginity in ways that young English women are not. English girls are easy and available, and Asian men seeking sexual experience will seek it from them, not from another Asian.”

“How nice of them,” Barbara commented acidly.

Azhar shrugged. “The community's values predominate when it comes to sex. The community values virginity in women prior to marriage and chastity in women after marriage. A young man seeking to sow wild oats will therefore sow them in an English girl's field, because English girls are seen as not considering virginity important. Thus, they are there for the taking.”

“And what if Querashi happened to run into an English girl who didn't share this charming attitude? What if he ran into an English girl who thought having it off with a bloke—whatever his colour, race, or religion—meant making a bloody commitment to him?”

“You're angry,” Azhar said. “But I meant no offence with this explanation, Barbara. If you ask questions about our culture, you'll doubtless hear answers now and again that are in conflict with your own beliefs.”

Barbara shoved her plate to one side. “And you'd do well to toss round the idea that my beliefs—as you call them—might bloody well reflect the beliefs of
my
culture. If Querashi put some English girl in the club and then came on like Rodney Righteous about how he had to do his duty to Sahlah Malik and excuse me but it doesn't really matter that you're up the spout because you're flipping English, how do you think her father or brother would react to this news?”

“Perhaps badly,” Azhar said. “Indeed, perhaps with murderous intentions. Wouldn't you agree?”

Barbara wasn't about to let him lead their conversation to an end of
his
choosing: the guilt of an Englishman. He was quick as a whip, but she was obdurate. “And what if the Maliks discovered all of this: the affair, the pregnancy. What if the woman—whoever she is—informed them in advance of telling Querashi? Wouldn't they be just a little put out?”

“You're asking if they would have murderous intentions as a result,” Azhar clarified. “But killing the bridegroom would hardly serve the purposes of the arranged marriage, would it?”

“Bugger the arranged marriage!” The crockery rattled when Barbara smacked her hand on the table. The remaining diners in the room glanced their way. Azhar had left his packet of cigarettes on the table, and she helped herself to one, saying in a lower voice, “Come on, Azhar. This situation plays both ways, and you know it. Sure, these are Pakistanis we're talking about, but they're also humans with human feelings.”

“You wish to believe someone within Sahlah's family committed this crime, perhaps Sahlah herself or someone acting for Sahlah.”

“I hear Muhannad's got something of a temper.”

“But there were several reasons why Haytham Querashi was chosen for her, Barbara. And foremost among them is that the family needed him. Every member of the family. He had expertise that they wanted for their factory: a business degree from Pakistan and experience in running the production side of a large factory. This was a mutually beneficial relationship: The Maliks needed him and he needed the Maliks. No one would have been likely to forget that, no matter what Haytham planned upon doing with the condoms in his pocket.”

“And they couldn't have got that same expertise from an Englishman?”

“They could have done, naturally. But my uncle's desire is to maintain this as a family business. Muhannad already serves in an important position. He cannot do two jobs. There are no other sons. Akram could bring in an Englishman, yes, but that would not be keeping the job within the family.”

“Unless Sahlah married him.”

Azhar shook his head. “Which would never be allowed.” He extended his cigarette lighter, and Barbara realised she'd not lit the fag that she'd been in such a tearing hurry to enjoy. She leaned into the flame. “So you see, Barbara,” Azhar concluded smoothly, “the Pakistani community had every reason to keep Haytham Querashi alive. It is only among the English that you will find the motive to kill him.”

“Is that so?” Barbara asked. “Well, let's not saddle our horses till we've put on our spurs, all right, Azhar?”

Azhar smiled. It looked as though he smiled in spite of an inner wisdom telling him not to. “Do you always address yourself to your work with this degree of passion, Sergeant Barbara Havers?”

“It makes the day just fly right by,” Barbara retorted.

He nodded and played his cigarette round the edge of the ashtray. Across the room, the last of the elderly couples were tottering towards the door. Basil Treves was hovering at the sideboard. He made busy noises as he filled six glass cruets from a plastic drum.

“Barbara, do you know how Haytham died?” Azhar asked quietly, eyes still on his cigarette's tip.

His question took Barbara by surprise. What took her more by surprise was her instant inclination to tell him the truth. She pondered for a moment, asking herself where this inclination had come from. And she found her answer in that nanosecond of warmth she'd felt between them when he'd asked her about the passion she applied to her work. But she'd learned the hard way to discount any warmth she might feel for another human being, especially a man. Warmth led to weakness and irresolution. Those two qualities were dangerous in life. They could be fatal when it came to murder.

She temporised with, “The postmortem's scheduled for this morning.” She waited for him to say, “And when they receive the report …?” But he didn't say it. He merely read her face, which she attempted to keep clear of incriminating information.

“Dad! Barbara! Look!”

Saved by the bell, Barbara thought. She looked towards the french doors. Hadiyyah was standing just outside with her arms extended to the sides and the red and blue beach ball sitting on her head.

“I can't move,” she announced. “I can't move a muscle. If I move, it'll fall. Can you do this, Dad? Can you do this, Barbara? Can you balance like this?”

That was the question, all right. Barbara scrubbed her napkin across her mouth and got to her feet. “Thanks for the conversation,” she said to Azhar, and then to his daughter, “The real pros can steady it on their noses. I expect you to have that mastered by dinner.” She took a final hit of her fag and stubbed it out in the ashtray. With a nod to Azhar, she left the room. Basil Treves followed her.

“Ah, Sergeant …?” He appeared Dickensian, Uriah Heepish in tone and posture with his hands clasped high on his chest as usual. “If I could have a moment …? Just over here …?”

Over here
was reception, a cavelike cubicle built under the stairs. Treves padded behind the counter and bent to retrieve something contained within a drawer. It was a sheaf of pink chits. He handed them to Barbara and leaned over the counter to speak conspiratorially. “Messages,” he breathed.

Barbara gave momentary thought to the disturbing connotation behind the cloud of gin he exhaled. She glanced at the chits and saw that they were torn from a book, carbon copies of telephone messages received. For an instant she wondered how she could have come to amass such a collection in so short a time, especially since no one from London knew where she was. But then she saw that they were made out to
H. Querashi.

“I was up before the birds,” Treves whispered. “Went through the message book and pulled all of his. I'm still working on his outgoing phone calls. How much time do I have? And what about his post? We don't generally record letters received by residents, but if I put my thinking cap on, I might be able to recall something helpful to our needs.”

Barbara didn't miss the plural possessive pronoun. “Everything and anything is helpful,” she said. “Letters, bills, phone calls, visitors. Anything.”

Treves’ face lit up. “As to that, Sergeant …” He glanced about. No one was near. The television in the lounge was playing the BBC morning news at a volume that would have drowned out Pavarotti bellowing
Pagliacci,
but Treves still maintained his air of caution. “Two weeks before he died, there
was
a visitor. I hadn't thought about it because they were engaged, after all, so why shouldn't she …? Although it did seem unusual to see her all got up that way. I mean, she doesn't usually. Not that she goes about in public that much. The family wouldn't have that, would they? So how am I to say that it was unusual in this case?”

“Mr. Treves, what the hell are you talking about?”

“The woman who came to see Haytham Querashi,” Treves said reasonably. He looked miffed that Barbara hadn't been following a train of thought that was chugging towards a perfectly obvious destination. “Two weeks before he died, he was visited by a woman. She came in that get-up they wear. God knows she must have been
cooking
under it, what with this heat and all.”

“A woman in a
chādor?
Is that what you mean?”

“Whatever they call it. She was all done up from head to toe in black, with slits for the eyes. She came in and asked for Querashi. He was in the lounge having his coffee. They had a whisper over by the door, right next to that umbrella stand, mind you. Then they went upstairs.” He looked pious as he concluded with, “I have no idea what they got up to in his room, by the way.”

“How long were they up there?”

“I didn't actually time them, Sergeant,” Treves answered archly. Then he added, as she was about to walk off, “But I dare say it was quite long enough.”

• • •

YUMN
STRETCHED LANGUIDLY and turned onto her side. She studied the back of her husband's head. In the house beneath their bedroom, she could hear the morning sounds telling her both of them should be up and about, but she liked the fact that while the rest of the family were busying themselves with the day's concerns, she and Muhannad were cocooned together with no concerns except for each other.

She raised a lazy hand to her husband's long hair—freed from its ponytail—and she insinuated her fingers into it.
“Meri-jahn,”
she murmured.

She did not have to glance at the small calendar on the bedside table to know what day this morning heralded. She kept a scrupulous record of her female cycle, and she'd seen the notation on the previous night. Relations with her husband today could lead to another pregnancy. And this more than anything—indeed, more than keeping the puling Sahlah firmly and permanently in her place—was what Yumn wanted.

Two months after Bishr's birth, she had begun to feel the urge for another child. And she'd begun turning to her husband regularly, arousing him to plant the seed of another son in the soil of her more than willing body. It
would
be another son, of course, once the pregnancy was achieved.

Yumn felt a physical stirring for him as she touched Muhannad. He was so lovely. What a change her marriage to such a man had brought to her life. The eldest sister, the least attractive, the most hopelessly unmarriageable in the eyes of her parents, and she—Yumn the sow and not one of her mild and doelike sisters—had proved herself an exceptional wife to an exceptional husband. Who would have thought it possible? A man like Muhannad could have had his pick of women, no matter the size of the dowry that her father had assembled to tempt him and his parents. As the only son of a father overly eager for grandchildren, Muhannad could have made certain that his every wish for a mate be embodied in the woman he ultimately took as his wife. He could have laid out his requirements in terms his father would not have dared to deny him. And having done so, he could have evaluated each potential bride presented by his parents and rejected anyone not meeting his specifications. But he had accepted his father's choice of her without question, and on the night they'd met, he had sealed their agreement to marry by taking her roughly in a dark corner of the orchard and making her pregnant with their first son.