Lion of Babylon (2 page)

Chapter Two

S
ameh climbed the courthouse stairs, burdened by far more than the day's heat. His name meant “he who is benevolent.” A more ancient interpretation was “he who is elevated,” in a spiritual sense. This particular morning, Sameh felt neither.

Nine o'clock in the morning and already the temperature approached thirty degrees Celsius, ninety degrees Fahrenheit. It was the twenty-third day of Ramadan. Muslim festivals were calculated on the twenty-eight-day lunar cycle, and this year Ramadan fell in May. During this festival, devout Muslims neither ate nor drank from sunrise to sunset.

Sameh was a lawyer and a member of the Syrian Christian Church, the majority church for Iraqi Christians—those who had not either fled or been decimated under Saddam. Out of general respect for the Muslim culture, Sameh did not eat or drink in public during Ramadan. But he was not a man accustomed to fasting. And he detested the way life ground to a halt for this entire month. Working hours were shortened and almost nothing got done. People grew increasingly irritable, and the heat only made things worse.

Sameh put off anything he possibly could until after Ramadan ended. But this day's task could not wait. A child's life was at stake.

He entered the Al-Rashid courthouse in the center of Baghdad. The place had not been swept since the festival began. All the custodial staff could be seen seated in the shade of a courtyard palm, smoking cigarettes and muttering in sullen tones.

The courthouse had originally been an Ottoman palace. Now it was stripped and battered and left with nothing but false pride and glorified memories. What had once been four formal chambers were now filled with papers and hostile employees and yellow dust. The air-conditioning had been out of commission for months. Most of the computers dotting the tables had shorted out. Documents were tied with twine and bundled like bricks, forming barriers between the office workers and their getting anything done.

Sameh waited his turn before a desk midway down the second hall. Omar was the senior clerk of court. He had been appointed to his position during the old regime. Under Saddam Hussein, every university graduate like Omar had been guaranteed a government job for life. He had been doing this job for twenty-three years and knew nothing else.

Life for people like Omar was not pleasant. Since Saddam's fall, salaries had shot up two thousand percent. Even so, they had not kept up with inflation. Omar considered himself a member of the lost generation. While in his twenties, he had endured the last months of the Iran-Iraq war. As a loyal veteran, he had been rewarded with a job in the courthouse. Which he hated. Then he had endured ten years of international embargo, followed by the wars that ousted Saddam. Whatever came now, whatever promise might evolve for the new Iraq, it would never touch him. As far as Omar was concerned, his life was over. He was forty-eight.

Normally, the only way to obtain anything from Omar was by having a senior judge order it. But most judges treated Ramadan as a holiday. Fasting made the judges who remained grumpy and impatient, which meant lawyers used any pretext possible to postpone trials. Heaven protect any criminal forced to enter a courtroom during Ramadan.

Sameh watched the man refuse one entreaty after another, and knew he had one slim chance. When his turn came, he decided to risk telling Omar the truth.

“I come to you as a supplicant,” he began. “As a beggar seeking bread only you can grant me.”

A faint spark ignited deep in the clerk's bored gaze.

“My client is a businessman. His youngest child has been abducted.”

Omar had the decency to wince. “When?”

“Two afternoons ago.”

A dozen others with courthouse business stood close behind Sameh, waiting their turn to make their entreaties. They moaned in unison at the news.

“Tragic,” one said.

“An epidemic,” said another.

Nowadays adults who saw children playing in the street threatened to punish them unless they went back indoors. Which of course the children hated. But a child who escaped into the hot Ramadan sunlight was a child under grave threat. Thieves had taken to cruising the streets of wealthy neighborhoods, snatching any child who happened to be alone.

This was what had happened to the son of Sameh's client.

“One moment the boy was indoors playing with his sisters,” Sameh said. “The next he slipped from the
murabiah
's grasp and flew out the door. By the time she was able to follow him outside, he was already a tragic statistic.”

Those waiting their turn played the choir, shaking their heads and bemoaning Baghdad's lawless state. Kidnapping had become a favorite tool of criminals. The banks and businesses all employed armed guards.

Despite himself, Omar was ensnared by the tragic drama. “How old is the boy?”

“Four,” Sameh replied. “Today is his birthday.”

“This is the truth? The kidnappers stole him away from his celebration?”

“You know me,” Sameh replied. “I do not lie.”

“It is true,” several murmured. “Sameh is the most honest man in Baghdad.”

“But I am just a clerk,” Omar said, palms raised. “What can I do?”

“The family's gardener vanished the same day as the child,” Sameh said.

The choir went silent.

Sameh said, “The
murabiah
is the mother's aunt; she has arthritis and is overweight. Even so, she claims it took her less than three minutes to follow the boy outside. Perhaps a carload of criminals happened to pass at this same moment. But neighbors do not recall seeing a car, and the street in front of their home is a quiet one. I wonder if perhaps the gardener had been waiting for just such an opportunity.”

The clerk said, “You want to know if the gardener has a record.”

“It is possible, no? One of Saddam's parting gifts to Baghdad.”

This drew a knowing murmur from the audience. In the closing days before the war, Saddam had released all violent criminals from prison. Why, no one knew. Even the members of his cabinet had been baffled by the action.

Sameh went on, “Perhaps the man decided to use the recent chaos as an opportunity to improve his economic position.”

Omar pursed his lips. “I suppose it is possible. But to discover this would be most difficult. So many of our archives from the Saddam era have been either lost or destroyed.”

Sameh knew the man was asking for a bribe. But Sameh was one of a growing number of people who felt corruption should die with the old regime. He said, “You
wish
they had all been destroyed. But they were not. So could you request a search of those we still have? Please, brother. For the sake of a lost and frightened child.”

Omar obviously realized that argument would do him no good. Sameh el-Jacobi was known far and wide as a man who stubbornly refused to offer a sweetener.

The clerk sighed noisily, wrote hastily, and tore the coveted slip from his pad. He handed it over without meeting Sameh's gaze. “For the child.”

“I and the child's parents offer our deepest thanks.”

Sameh bowed to Omar. He shook hands with the other petitioners, accepting their best wishes in finding the child. He walked down the long hall to the central file office. Behind the counter, file clerks clustered about the few functioning computers and avoided even glancing toward anyone seeking help.

The office's lobby area was filled with people long used to waiting on bureaucracy. They formed a sort of club, bound together by grim humor. People slipped out for a smoke, supposedly forbidden during Ramadan, and returned. There was humor about that. Even after twenty-three days of daylight fasting, still the banter continued. Sameh was greeted as a member in good standing. A space was made for him on one of the hard wooden benches lining the walls. Sameh asked how long the wait was. Even this was cause for laughter. Days, a lawyer replied. Weeks, another responded. The old man seated next to Sameh said he had been there since the previous Ramadan.

But this day, Sameh was fated not to wait at all.

———

A few moments after Sameh settled himself, two men stepped into the room. Instantly the lobby's atmosphere tensed. Like all bodyguards to Baghdad's power elite, the pair wore dark suits and light-colored shirts and no ties. But these two also had closely trimmed beards. Which meant they guarded a religious official. All talk on both sides of the counter ceased.

The vizier, the personal aide to the Grand Imam, entered behind them. Respectful murmurs arose, hushed greetings. The vizier looked thoroughly displeased to be here. Which was hardly a surprise. During Ramadan, such officials rarely took on anything other than the most important religious duties. For the vizier to personally come to the courthouse indicated a most serious matter.

The bodyguards pointed in Sameh's direction. The vizier's features twisted in bitter lines. “You are the lawyer el-Jacobi?”

The use of surnames was relatively new to Arab culture. After the First World War, Ataturk had ordered it in his drive to westernize the Turks. Over the last century most Arabs had reluctantly adopted the practice, taking the name of their family's home village or a trade or the name of one of the Prophet's descendants. Sameh's grandfather had adopted the first name of a famous forebear, Jacobi, a powerful minister during the Ottoman Empire. Sameh bore his surname with pride.

Before Sameh could respond, a fourth man entered. This time everyone rose to their feet. Their greetings were both grave and loud. Jaffar was the Grand Imam's son, the heir apparent, and a recognized imam in his own right.

The word
imam
meant “one who stood before others.” An imam was generally recognized as both a scholar and religious leader. The Imam Jaffar spent a few minutes circulating among the waiting group, greeting each in turn, including the clerks who now clustered by the front counter. But his gaze repeatedly returned to Sameh.

Sameh knew Jaffar's father, the religious leader of Iraq's Shia population, which was the majority of Iraq's Muslim community. The Shia formed a majority only in Iraq, Iran, and Bahrain. In the rest of the world, they were not just a minority, but persecuted. Saddam Hussein's regime had been Sunni by heritage. The Shia under Saddam had suffered immensely, along with the Christians.

Jaffar's father was part of an august Persian dynasty that traced its heritage back to the Prophet. Unlike many of the current generation of Shia scholars, Jaffar considered himself utterly Arab, endearing him to the local populace. Jaffar was also fluent in Farsi, the language of Iran, out of respect to his father and the family dynasty. This had forged alliances among the conservatives.

Sameh had never met the man before. But Sameh held great hopes for his country under Jaffar's religious guidance. The father was ailing and not expected to live long. Sameh would never have prayed for a man's demise. But he looked forward to the day Jaffar became leader of the Shia community.

Those sentiments were not shared by the father's vizier. Sameh had never met this man either, but his first encounter confirmed everything he had heard. The vizier directed the same hostility toward Jaffar as he aimed at Sameh.

Jaffar had made no attempt to hide his plans to institute changes as soon as he officially became Iraq's chief cleric. And the first change would be to retire the vizier.

The vizier controlled access to the Grand Imam and held enormous power. Jaffar never spoke of what he thought of the vizier. He did not need to. Everyone knew the vizier's days were numbered.

Jaffar now approached Sameh with his hand upon his heart, a gesture of deep respect. “Sayyid.”

Even the vizier was surprised by this manner of address. Sameh himself was staggered.
Sayyid
was used by devout Muslims to denote a distinguished superior. It was ironic for Jaffar to address Sameh in this manner, as
sayyid
was the term most often used to describe Jaffar himself. What was more, Sameh was known throughout Baghdad as a devout Christian. Yet the imam addressed him as he would another religious leader. Throughout the room, eyes went round.

“Sayyid,” Jaffar repeated, shaking Sameh's hand. “A matter of great import has arisen.”

“How might I be of service to the honored teacher?”

Jaffar gestured toward the door. “Perhaps you would be so kind as to accompany me?”

Sameh was too skilled a negotiator to let such an opportunity slip by. He grimaced with regret and raised his voice. “Unfortunately, honored sir, I also have a matter that cannot wait. A child has been kidnapped. The information I seek could be of crucial importance. Both for the child and his family.”

Jaffar's eyes glimmered with understanding. He turned to the others and said, “Good sirs, I am in great need of this man's services. Would you grant me a Ramadan boon and allow him the first place in line?”

From that point, the inquiry took on a dreamlike ease. Sameh approached the counter, where eight file clerks now waited to serve him with an eagerness bordering on panic.